Sean Badenhorst

No.

sproingbuck?

Since we're on this topic, does anyone know what happened to Hendrik de Villiers, our male triathlete in Beijing? He was ranked 8th in the world going into the Games and finished 4th at the World Champs in June. An outside shot a medal with those credentials, but he did not start...

No wonder he didn't win, the back wheel has absolutely no traction...

In the cycle industry's defence, some non-athletic guy asking for a bike and spares to ride around the coast of Africa alone, is kind of unusual. I'm not condoning a lack of support, but when I worked at Ride and Bicycling, I used to get scores of requests for support or bikes or something for people doing some or other 'adventure' journey. Adventure means different things to different people of course. The fact that Riaan actually completed his adventure is amazing. I remember when he set off thinking he wouldn't make it ? and I'm an optimist! I still interact quite regularly with many of the bike importers and can tell you they get inundated with sponsorship requests all the time. Just because they didn't support Riaan, doesn't mean they're mean. They may have just exhausted their sponsorship budget on some or other meaningful cause. Slightly related, but worth telling, I remember not long after we'd launched Bicycling, this Kevin chap, dressed in a smart suit, having a meeting with us to tell us about this mountain bike stage race he was planning to organise from Knysna to Stellenbosch that would become the biggest thing to hit mountain biking in SA and asking us to be a media partner. We thought his plan was a bit ambitious and said that once the first edition had been completed we could talk again. Little did we know the Cape Epic would achieve such success in such a short time. Well done to Riaan and Kevin for proving me wrong. That kind of passion and determination are qualities that separate talkers from doers.

I'm not going to rehash what I've already said on the other threads that relate to this topic, other than this: To improve our Olympic Games performance, we need: 1. A plan 2. Competent administrators 3. Sponsorship Note: we don't have No. 3 right now because we don't have No. 1 or No. 2 and; politics is unavoidable in sport. Sean Badenhorst2008-08-29 11:04:32

Now that your nose is employed there, might as well check if they have jobs for the rest of you? At least you already have a foot in the door...

this reminds me of Adelle inctroduction in Ride mag a month or two ago. For the boys birthday his dad took him and some friends to Wimpby' date=' Dad dressing as Batman/Superman, those underpants, how can someone like that be a hero?, what a plonker. Goodness.. do something creative. shows the imagination doing the rounds in this country.[/quote'] I am lost here?? - I seldom read Ride Magazine and when I do I seldom agree or find merit in any of Adelles features. ...But, be that as it may.............. Which boys are we referring to?? Whats wrong with a Dad taking his kids to Wimpy and dressing up. Is it not rather presumptious to pass judgement on that family.? Wow, that's a cool dad! Not sure I'd go as far as to dress as Spidey myself, but I respect that dad for being so committed to making his kid's birthday even more memorable. I bet that dad is his son's biggest hero, the way it should be.

TAG?? Are you still in the dark ages pal? Patek Phillipe sets the minimum standard in horological requirements within the financial hub of SA!! Yep, Tag is so last millennium. Like Delgado says, it's Patek Phillipe and Andemars Piguet that keep our Nigerian cracksellers and Primadonna pretty boys waiting tables in Jozi. Why aim low?

Problem is' date=' the riders don't have the money to get a decent lawyer and many lawyers don't want anything to do with cycling. Then someone else said about the riders must make sure its part of a contract and not word of mouth....well, for the riders that have contracts, many teams still don't give half of what they should get. The manager just pull up his shoulders and say he received nothing and can't do nothing, cause he cares actually about bullsh*t and won't do anything to get his lazy ass of the chair. If you one of the few that have the money to go after a manager with a lawyer, well. With the way cycling here is going on, you will just get screwed later for just standing for your rights. Ladies cycling here is a sick joke with all this nonsens. You can say they improved this year with riding with vets and so.....that is just bull......with things like this ladies racing will stay the same.[/quote'] Seems to be a lot of generalising here. If it was that bad for all the pros, why don't they do something about it? Don't get used a problem, find a flippen solution, otherwise in three year's time you'll be posting the same criticisms on The Hub.

No, the heading should read: What went Wong in Beijing? Ah so!

Don't get me started on this topic again...

From Wikipedia: Before track cycling, Chris Hoy raced BMX between the ages of 7 and 14 and was ranked 2nd in Britain, 5th in Europe and 9th in the world. From Wikipedia: Born in Ashford, Kent, Jamie Staff first got started in BMX when he was 9 years old, after seeing friends riding.[2] A BMX rider who has won just about everything from the World Championships downwards, he decided at the end of 2001 that he wanted to win an Olympic medal. As BMX was not an Olympic sport at the time, he turned his attention to track cycling. From Velonews: It was on the track, following his BMX days, that Cavendish really cut his teeth, becoming world Madison champion in 2005, Commonwealth scratch champion in 2006 and winning another Madison gold at the worlds earlier this year.

No Cervelo for CSC-Saxobank either.

Can I get a print of this - in jumbo size? I dig your pic Holy. Thanks.

Some training plans here on the Amashova site: http://www.amashovashova.co.za/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=9&Itemid=25 Sean Badenhorst2008-08-26 13:43:06

cycleq, surely if he had ridden the see-saw successfully previously, it has some bearing on this case?

Hey Colonel. Your proactivity paid off! Clynt emailed me this today: --- Hi Sean It has been brought to my attention that there is a discussion on thehubsa.co.za regarding Mr Price and our apparent stance with regards to mountain bike sponsorship and lack of interest in leveraging these sponsorships. Burry is not a Mr Price Contracted athlete. Burry is contracted to GT USA while he is campaigning abroad and to Omnico SA (importers of GT bicycles) while he competes locally. Mr Price has a sponsorship contract with Omnico SA which covers the title sponsorship of their Mongoose Mountain bike team, Mongoose Downhill team, Mongoose BMX team as well as their GT mountain bike team. They contract the athletes, run and manage these team and we pay them a title sponsorship fee. Not unlike the sponsorship of the Sharks rugby team. Given this info do you think it would be fair to blame us for poor media communication for the Sharks rugby team or not ?punting? the Sharks enough? I understand your passion for cycling and your critical views and opinions are born out of a love for the sport but I would like to point out a few facts with regards to our support of South African sportsmen and women which may influence your decision to post comments like: ?Have already done my share of pointing out cycling-related shortcomings to Mr Price re media exposure. A few nervous moments by their incumbent PR/Media supplier, followed by an apology and that seemed to be all that was needed. Never improved their cycling exposure or accuracy in what little exposure they do get. Mr Price could get so much more return on investment from their cycling sponsorships (for example, Burry is so marketable) and that may make the difference between them sticking with cycling/MTB or moving on to another sport.? I think that this comment is a little unfair given our extensive commitment to Sport in South Africa (over the past 15 years), currently Mr Price supports 98 individually contracted athletes that are on our payroll, 73 of these are runners, 4 triathletes, 11 surfers, 3 motocross riders, 2 karters, 2 super moto riders, 2 BMX riders and 1 FMX rider. We then have a further 15 mountain bike / BMX riders that form part of the Omnico teams (Mr Price GT & Red Mongoose) of which Burry is a part of. We also sponsor a Gauteng based junior road cycling team as well as a KZN based vet?s road cycling team (approximately 22 squad members). We have 48 High School rugby teams, 17 High Schools soccer teams, a soccer league in Mitchells Plein, The Natal Sharks rugby team and a world qualifying series surfing event in Durban as well as the Mr Price Karkloof Mountain Bike race and we are also support partners for the Sani2C, Midmar Mile, Specsavers IronMan and Comrades marathon. The bulk of our sponsorships have been part of our program for many years (some as long as 9 or 10 years), we do not just ?move on?. We do not operate in the traditional corporate way of allocating leveraging budgets like MTN or any of the big corporates as we would rather see that money be going directly to the athletes to assist them in their careers. It is our view that their achievements will then be picked up by the media and they will become ambassadors of our brand. We could be accused of supporting too many athletes to our detriment. We could quite simply drop a portion of our sponsorship program and invest that money in ?advertising? our sponsorships but have chosen not to. There are arguments for both approaches and both have their pros and cons. Your posts have certainly caused us to question our approach and no doubt assess the job we are doing with our diverse sponsorship program given the proliferation of professionalism in all sport types. Clynt Lund Marketing Manager, Mr Price ----- I apologised to Clynt for making a comment without knowing all the facts and told him I'd post his reply here. I think it makes for very interesting reading and gives some insight into Mr Price's diverse bouquet of sport sponsorship commitment. Pierre Tostee, who heads up Mr Price Media, also called me today and we had a long chat. I have known Pierre for almost 20 years (we raced on the KZN Standard/Olympic distance triathlon team together very long ago!) and it was good to find out more about Mr Price's sponsorship structure. A system which favours spending more money on athletes rather than diverting some budget to media/PR leveraging, which is the dominant model these days as media exposure can be measured a lot more accurately than incidental exposure and therefore gives valuable/critical feedback regarding a corporate's return on sponsorship investment.

Really great idea - I know that in Oz they have already had government sponsored research into the value of cycle tourism. Now imagine hooking up a public / private sponsorship deal' date=' with City of Cape Town and the Cape Town Partnership (or the equivalents in other cities), promoting the destination overseas whilst developing the sporting talent of the country at the same time..... Sean, seriously, who'd you take this to if you wanted to turn itinto a formally developed proposal? [/quote'] I'm not sure. I reckon I'd start with a well-respected, well-connected businessman that has some political influence and an interest in cycling.