Danger Dassie

He did have some time on a demo/pre prod proto afaik, had a discussion at one of the launches and one of the S staffers mentioned it. Apparently, his testing feedback was that the new model is like a better more polished version of the previous Epic Evo. Would speculate that should also be taken in the context of a competitive race bike. Reckon Matt's pro moto background makes his feedback especially invaluable. Several brands launch their new models around this time, for eg; Liv, Cannondale, Bulls, Titan. Especially with Olympics around the corner. IMHO this makes for good timing alongside Cape Epic and a smart brand can use this to their advantage.

And a stupidly ridiculous amount of ice cream parlours!.... Heaven!

Must say I was pleasantly surprised with Tulbagh/Saronsburg. Some absolute quality riding and outdoors exploring around there, plus housing seems pretty cheap. Swellendam gets another vote, apparently the fastest economic growth. Also apparently, the region between these up to Wellington is fast becoming a thriving outdoors/adventure sports scene. Depends on what your work entails and what kind of town/suburban balance you're looking for.

That's so mooi its mooist. Congrats!

Please PM me, I know of a few guys who may be able to assist.

Would be quite cool to see if SRAM/RockShox do some kind of a Lefty collab with Flight Attendant.

Jasper is an absolute mullet and legend, class human.

Imho there’s a fair amount of amateur coverage amongst the highlights packages etc. Arguably there could be more depth, at the same time who pays for this? Using the heli as am example, flying hours are already at their limit, including the pilot, camera operator, editing and producers. So to extend that means an extra crew on a heli, pilot, cameraman and producer hours for editing, or draw down hours on capturing elites. As it is, the eyeballs are drawn by what happens in the elite race, this is a fact. It is the driving impetus behind coverage.

Ya, like the vids but it's a very different consumption, plenty demand for copy/photos though. Still correlating a lot of stuff among other work, but here's Impey's bike. Nothing spectacular customisation wise, but I quite like it for the fact that it's essentially stock off the floor and good enough for a WT pro. Theres a bunch of stuff from last year as well. https://off.road.cc/content/feature/bike-check-daryl-impeys-scott-spark-rc-900-world-cup-edition-14595

38t for Grotts while Matt seems to alternate sizes. According to some of the team staff, did some bike checks yesterday.

Saw that, not sure if it may be down to illness or not. Towards the end his partner Nortje wasn't too far off from the Specialized and Scott/Ridley breakaway, flying through the singletrack.

Wild bru, wild!

From my experience, a blue board rider is someone who finished outside of cutoff but is allowed to start again the next day. Albeit if they miss the cutoff again, they're out.

Nope. Everything is accounted for. Also, gross turnover from a thumbsuck of entries doesn't equate to net profit.

Tents are decent and the food is way better! Can see that there have been a number of changes for the better in general.

Rider tents a vast improvement over previous years. Significantly larger and made with proper weather proofed rip stop canvas, shade net liners for doors/windows and a sponsor branded sun cover.

“From a crazy idea in an adventurous young man’s mind to the world’s most prestigious mountain bike stage race, the Absa Cape Epic celebrates its 20thedition this month. We tracked down the man that founded the race, Kevin Vermaak, and asked him a few burning questions about the race’s past – and its future…...” https://www.treadmtb.co.za/where-to-now-for-absa-cape-epic-founder-kevin-vermaak/

Please say the full internal routing doesn't include routing through the headset!

Found some frames…

Great work guys, haven't been back in a while, must do a revisit.

It's not killing anything. Take a breath and stop projecting assumptions. There's a world of bike options outside of a 300k Epic which makes up a fraction of the total market, pro or for fun. Teams often get bikes as part of a sponsorship package, there is a variety of ways this gets negotiated on top of everything else.

Even as hot takes go, that's pretty wild.

CellC were involved. You don't need to throw massive dollars at fluff nonsense, plough it into marketing/comms and operations and it can be a success. The event enjoyed success in several other metros. HSP (94.7 org) was originally involved at some point. But what killed it was the typical politics of bureaucracy, egos and money, this was clear during stage 2's post-media briefing. The organisers were blunt and defensive.

In short, rolling road closure doesn't work too well in Joburg and you need the right organiser/comms. I was there to help one of the teams with media images (Nedbank 360) and witnessed first-hand the behaviour of some of our Joburg residents for stage 2, in particular Sandton. It's a great concept and all, but really needs the right organising team. If I get a gap I'll see if I can dig up the photos I caught on the day.

You’ve seen the roadworks and developments in the area no? So it really is out of the hands of Taroko Trails as the property owners (NMT) have to close that gate. Coming from Flamingo Centre really makes no difference wether you use the main road or reserve road to ride on. In fact you can still ride along the reserve road most of the way and then at the gate go upto the road and straight into Taroko Farms. Personally have never waited 40min for to pay, if it’s an issue then maybe look at one of the season bands.