Tieffels

My GF got me the Footprints (of guide book fame) MTBing Europe dedicated guide. Stunning. They try and feature the lesser know spots/resorts. There is a place in Austria with 700km of XC trails glo. Is going to be my next gift to myself..

Omega Man, are you pretty good or are the other people pretty useless? I'm technically useless but I fancy myself going faster then most of the people you passed.. But these things can be deceiving. Awesome riding though. I can see why people look at you funny in the US/Euro if you want to buy a 100mm travel bike..

Mrmed, well done!!!! Please provide some details. Hope some bones were broken in the process..

Ben you absolute LEGEND you!! Cat-i, what is the best way of following the race, or rather what works for you? Just to let the family and friends know.

Always a difficult one to put down objectively, esp. when you start factoring in the days as you mentioned.. For the Epic I rocked up, rode and went home. Might have had a beer or 3 somewhere along the line but that was it.. Investing heaps of money in Arctic gear, new shoes, hundreds of other odds and sods and other survival equipment (lights) adds up very quickly. Taking a month off work makes it an even more costly excessive. If I had to donate a rand to the FC Scholarship fund for every rand I spent would mean the fund would be getting involved in adult night schooling as well due to lack of kids.. Is it worth it though, as you know yourself, for sure! Enjoy your ride as well!

So I have entered the 2011 Freedom Challenge race across South Africa (RASA) starting on Thursday the 16th. There is so much that can be said about this ride, so many sub-stories and millions of facets, but after everything is said and done, it seemingly always comes back to this one concept, for me at least: How lucky am I that I get the chance to attempt this! I would liked to have used the word privileged but alas it’s been too tainted in our society. Still, had it not been for so many hundreds of puzzle pieces coming together I’d never have been in this position. Having the finances (considerably more expensive than Epic btw), an understanding boss, a supportive family and esp GF, the health and ability, a fortunate upbringing.. these are just the obvious main points. But I can think back at so many people I’ve met and conversations I’ve had and accounts that I’ve read that slowly pointed me in this direction, events that slowly nudged me along this path until you simply end up being swept along the torrent towards the start.. (The torrent and dramatic sweeping along luckily only start to happen after you’ve paid your deposit so fear not..) But stepping back from it all, the last port of call is again how lucky am I! Imagine if more people could be in this position, where they are given the opportunity to chase their dreams. And I don’t for a second want my dream given to me, but only hope that I have in this life the opportunity to chase it. Now I have. Lucky me! If you would like to help in giving other people the opportunity to chase their dream, through education in this instance, please check out this video and if you want to contribute please visit My link and make a donation if you can. Every R30k raised puts a kid through school. It is that simple. Should you wish to make a large donation (% admin fee charged through backabuddy) please contact the fund directly through the Freedom Challenge website See you on the trails.

My experience: Did the Epic on 2 pairs of FA shorts (brand new) and a bib (new-ish). No worries whatsoever. Then recently they all started chafing me badly. Turns out the padding is a laminate of various foam thicknesses glued together and this came undone. So now before every ride I have to spend 20min trying to sort out the padding that has crumpled up into one corner of the chamois. Not ayoba at 4:30 in the AM. On one I ended up cutting a small slit and pulled out the padding. Seems to have helped, but ja, there is no way I can do an 3h+ ride on these any more, and they lasted just over a year. The Anatomic I have (also did the Epic from a well ridden in state) has done a wack better against considerable more abuse. Would recommend them above FA.

Ja, you'll battle to get a bike shop to do Spez for the reasons mentioned above. I personally bought mine in coming back from the states and had a family friend bring one in for my dad. The best bet is to have someone on that side ship it for you, i.e. buy online and send to 3rd party and get them to forward it to you. Sommer in 2 shipments to save on duties.. To me buying outside of SA is the only way to own a Spez, local prices are crazy. Just out of interest, I got a warranty frame locally when I cracked the first one, because I still had all the original paperwork etc proving I was the original owner, but since then I think that ship might have sailed. Good luck

My suggestion: get hold of the legend that is Jaco Strydom. Well, wait till he's finished his Beit2Cape ride which he is currently on (incorporating the Freedom Challenge), and then get hold of him. In Dec/Jan of 09/10 we did a 7 day (I think) ride with him from Oliviersnek Pass to Rhodes picking up the Freedom Challenge trail about halfway. It was pure MTBing bliss, coming very very close to the Epic (2010 at least) in ride quality, except you are a small group of people so the experience is quite different. He sorts out all the nitty gritty detail and has the route waxed. That is ultimately the problem with self organized touring, you don’t have the time to suss out the best possible trail and end up on bigger roads etc. Not with Jaco, the route has it all. Cannot remember the actual cost, but it was a bargain for what we got.

I watched the Carte Balance insert on the Rolex gang last night on MNET, and was amazed at how much the private security guys (granted, they operate from Hillbrow which in my book is pretty bad ass..) managed to get done just be simply getting stuck in. They also traced their calls made from the stolen phone etc etc.. I'd be more than happy to contribute to a pool of funds to get these guys on the case and fight back..

Speak to JB. The interesting thing is he does not offer any of this half and full service BS. He takes you bike, checks everything, fixes what is broken and charges you only for the work he does.

I had the MUD version, knobblies tore off, rapid wear etc.. I buy whatever is on special tyre wise and just wing it, cannot be bothered with brands etc, but man these were crap, I'll steer well clear of Michelin in the future.

Just to throw a spanner in the works: During way student days the sum total of my chain management strategy was to chuck on more squirt every now and again.. Spray off the muck every now and again with a hosepipe. I'm not a squirt zealot but it keeps the chain looking clean, if nothing else. Recently I started going things the "right" way: paraffin and chain in bottle and shake and soak, lube with squirt thereafter. I'm convinced my chain now makes more noise and sooner after every lube than before. My conclusion is that the degreaser option is too aggressive and flushed out the residual oil hidden where it actually is required to work, so you have to relube the chain REALLY well afterwards with oil, which causes a mess which makes chain wear worse.. These day I lube with oil till I think I have the lubrication back inside the chain and then use squirt to keep up appearances..

Not sure if you really after an answer to the opening question, but we were about 5 guys going bit quicker, about 5+ okes in the middle and a couple of peeps bringing up the rear. But the NB thing is everybody enjoyed it. Sadly cannot make it this week otherwise I'm going to try make it every week.

I got the B7 and the HR7 for the Freedom Challenge.. Have only used the H7 so far and its not bad for the price..

I'll try make it tomorrow, just need to jig up a light of sorts..

Not sure how you get to your favourite trail partly because I don’t know you, where you live, where the aforementioned trail is in relation to your unknown place of domicile or your preferred method of transport which could be your MTB, your 29er road bike, the LDV or the Audi. Guess there are many options really, but by your implied sarcasm I'm guessing that you don’t carry your bike for the 15km on your back? But, dude, to spell it out for you, if I talk about my "morning tarmac training ride" (as per your post) it is a ride, in the morning, on tarmac. And only tarmac. As you said, and I agree 100% that this is where the 29er is king. You might look at flogging that Stumpjumper and getting the Tarmac as it is a bit heavy at 9.5kgs.. Should the ride include a tarmac section to a MTB trail, I'd talk about my morning MTB ride.

I was just saying my 29er is faster on my morning tarmac training ride.. no wait, that is what you said..

I'm also very fortunate to have both a 26er and a 29er, the second one is called a road bike and we seem to use them in a similar fashion. Sjoe, glad I'm not getting left behind on the 29er trend.. Yes, its slow going this friday..

How far do you want to ride, and how far are you prepared to mission to get there? Not sure how far from white river, but Mankele is the obvious first choice in the Lowveld. Never been myself but have not heard one bad thing about it. I was in Hazyview the last weekend, stuffed around on the tracks of Sabie River Adventures, was very nice. Also bundu bashed a route I mapped on Google Earth that was longer and a tad adventurous at times. Also saw ads for Cycles Junkies, I'd recommend getting in touch with them, maybe they can give you better suggestions for closer to home. Enjoy, there is some good riding out there

Rode the inaugural 100miler a couple of years back with a guy with carbon tubbies. To this day still the worst cycling conditions I've encountered. So about 14km from the end they guy cuts the tubbie badly. This is after 8 or 9h of rain, mud and a constant headwind. So what can you do, he said he'll phone his wife but I could see the guy was very very bleak about not finishing after a titanic struggle.. Saw him at another race a couple of weeks later, noticed he had a brand spanking new wheelset. Turns out he was so gatvol with the tubbies he rode the last 14km on the carbon rim, writing of 5k in the process and chucked them.. Hope it partly answers your question.

OK seriously, we need to agree on some of your definitions, otherwise there is a lot of contradicting between what you are saying and how I understand things.. XC = Cross Country. The Olympic sport of MTBing. Short technical laps, fairly technical, as in most normal okes would walk plenty times. That is how I understand it at least, and by the sounds of it this is the type of riding you enjoy. So in my mind this is exactly where a 29er should suck? Yet you say it is good to race XC on? Cross country does not mean riding across the country.. Rather I think you're talking about marathon riding when you say XC. That is big long outrides with a good mix of jeep track/gravel roads etc. Think MTN Ultra rides, Sabie, Barberton, Attakwas etc. Yes, then 29er might make sense.

If any of you guys are in doubt about committing to this, just do it. The payback time is less than 1 year, and it will last you a lifetime.. In fact I cannot think of a better investment into your cycling.

To me these results are so close together, esp taking into account the higher ave HR on the 29 on both runs, that the only conclusion I get to is that the performance of the bikes are pretty much the same. However, I know the track in Jonkers they did the tests on, very rocky and rutted in places, very easy to loose time bumping into stuff. Actually it is the EXACT same track that has since forever popped into my mind when everybody raves about 29ers, esp the rolling over roots/rocks bit. I just kept thinking if I had a 29, and all the hype surrounding it is true, man I'd destroy that section. Well, Sauser proved this not to be the case, at least not to me..

I've bonked once or twice on Malto so speak from experience. The worse was coming into Oakvalley on last years Epic, having just gone over Groenlandberg a couple of km's back. It was this little nondescript hill, say 200m long. About 30m in I could feel something was wrong, about 30m later I was swerving across the road as my legs deserted me. Dead as a Dodo. What did I do you ask? Grab my bottle of 32GI you hope? Hardly. Downed some more Malto and a Mulebar and all the other food I had on me, crested the hill somehow, bombed the short downhill of the back and wow and behold by the next climb a couple of minutes later I was powering away again. Kapow! As if nothing had happened. If 3 minutes is battling to recover then yes, guilty as charge. But I can tell you about the 3h of absolute battling I endured at the hands of 32GI during the Magoebaskloof MTB race last year. Because I've been warned by you and the other hubbers of the 32GI marketing club about negating the affect by combining 32GI with high GI intakes I avoided all other sweet stuff. And since it gives you 2h of sustained energy why worry. After the start of the race I felt pretty flat, and then like fructose (apparently) slowly tapered off to even greater flatness and then tipped over into all round uselessness. After 3h I gave up and at the next waterpoint drowned myself in Coke. Best thing I've ever done. After that I was loving it. I also suspect that I suffered unnecessarily at the Clarens Ultra because we had 32GI at the water table instead of the usual Coke or Energade.. But as far as hangover cures go, nothing touches 32GI. I’m onto my second tub. As far as riding goes: If 32GI works for you, you’re going too slow. But that is just my opinion.