Christian Vande Velde (born May 22, 1976) is a retired American professional road racing cyclist of Belgian descent, who rode professionally between 1998 and 2013. Vande Velde competed for the , , and squads. He has been a cycling analyst for NBC Sports since 2014. He is the son of United States Bicycling Hall of Fame inductee John Vande Velde. Career 1998–2006 Vande Velde started his Grand Tour career by participating in the 1998 Vuelta a España, where he assisted Lance Armstrong, to a fourth-place finish. Vande Velde twice rode on the Tour de France team that brought Lance Armstrong to victory, in 1999, and 2001. In the 1999 Tour de France, Vande Velde was for a time the leader of the young rider classification; he did not compete, however, in the 2000 Tour de France. Vande Velde moved to in 2004, and switched to in 2005. During this time, he worked as a domestique, riding in support of varying team captains, even though the 2005 season saw Vande Velde taking chances of his own. In one instance, Vande Velde was a breakaway participant on the fourth stage of the Eneco Tour. The breakaway, however, was eventually hampered when the peloton was led on a false route, meaning the breakaway riders had to wait for the peloton to get back on track, at which time the gap between the break and the peloton was reduced from six to four minutes with 43 kilometres to go. At the 2006 Tour de Luxembourg, Vande Velde showed impressive performances in the mountains, which secured him first overall in the general classification. In the 2006 Tour de France, he was a domestique on for team captains Carlos Sastre and Fränk Schleck. Vande Velde was the best of the climbers in the team apart from Sastre and Schleck, whom he supported in the high mountain stages. On Stage 16, he pulled for most of the early slopes of the Col de la Croix de Fer, after which, team-mates Sastre and Schleck attacked to put then race leader Floyd Landis () under pressure. On Stage 17, to Morzine, he again pulled for most of the day along with team-mates Jens Voigt, Matthias Kessler, and Serhiy Honchar from the . 2007–2011 With 's team time trial win, Vande Velde became the first American to wear the pink jersey as leader of the general classification since Andrew Hampsten