According to his family, business and community leader and road tragedy victim Nicolas Calavrias was "Our Man of Steel."
Yesterday the family poured out its grief in a Napier courtroom as the other side of the tragedy, high-achieving former Dannevirke High School student Samuel James Trotter, was sentenced to six months' community detention, nine months' supervision and disqualified from driving for a year for causing the death when his car ran into the rear of the bike Mr Calavrias was riding near Taupo during a holiday in January.
Trotter, 22, pleaded guilty before Tony Adeane in Napier District Court on April 12 to a charge of careless driving causing death as he was driving back to home and his work as an engineer in Auckland after visiting family in Southern Hawke's Bay.
He was travelling at about the speed limit on the 100kmh State Highway 1 Taupo late on the Saturday morning of January 7 when his car veered left and hit 67-year-old recently-retired Steel and Tube head and Wellington Greek community leader Mr Calavrias ONZM from behind.
It was a moment's inattention as Trotter glanced at a Moto-X track beside the highway, and he would later tell police he did not see Mr Calavrias who had set out on a regular training ride from his holiday home a short while earlier, wearing bright yellow high-visibility gear and a helmet, and riding on a tarmac berm commonly used by cyclists.