Podcast: Unpacking the Magic of Mountain Biking in Tasmania, with Mark and Brendan from Tailored Trails

Tasmania has quietly built a reputation as one of the most diverse and rewarding mountain biking destinations in the world. In this special episode of The Mind Mountain Podcast, recorded at Maydena Bike Park over the final days of our Tasmanian Mountain Bike Expedition, I sit down with our partners Mark and Brendan from Tailored Trails to dive into all things riding bikes in Tasmania.

We talk about what makes Tasmania such a special place to ride - the abundance of terrain all packed into a small island, the variety of trail styles, and the unique riding culture that’s developed there. From bike park laps to big adventure riding days, the conversation quickly turns into a deep-dive on how and why Tasmania consistently delivers some of the most rewarding riding anywhere in the world.

You’ll also hear from a few of our expedition guests, who jump in to share their favourite trails, key takeaways, and standout moments from the trip so far. Their perspectives capture what it actually feels like to ride day after day in unfamiliar terrain, with new people, and with enough support to push your limits without tipping over them.

Along the way, Mark, Brendan, and I dig into the mental side of riding, sharing some practical strategies we used and taught on this trip. We talk about the most common skills we end up coaching in Tasmania, how riders adapt to the terrain, and why confidence, decision-making, and pacing matter just as much as fitness or technique.

This episode is a behind-the-scenes look at Tasmania’s mountain biking culture - the people, the places, the trails, and the resources that make it such a special destination to explore on two wheels. Whether you’re considering applying to join one of our mtb expeditions, curious about riding in Tasmania, or simply want to hear honest reflections from riders and guides who know the area well, this conversation brings it all together.

You can listen to the episode by searching 'The Mind Mountain' on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or on our podcast webpage. For more information about riding in Tasmania and upcoming expeditions, visit our Global MTB Expeditions page.

Happy trails,

Jake

FULL EPISODE TRANSCRIPT [00:00:00] 

Introduction and Welcome

welcome back to The Mind Mountain Podcast. We are here for a very special episode today, coming live to you from the Maydena Bike Park. It's day two for us here in the bike park last day of our Tasmanian mountain bike expedition, and you're about to hear a, a beautiful, beautiful chat I had with the legends Mark and Brendon.

Here at Tailored Trails. before we do that, we're gonna hear from a couple of our awesome guests to give you a, a bit of an insight into what the Tasmanian Mountain Bike experience has been all about. Okay? 

Guest Interviews: Thomas from New Zealand

I've got my friend Thomas here.

Thomas, how's it going? Is from one of the other mountain bike meccas of the world coming from Wanaka New Zealand. Thomas, what's been one of your favorite trails so far? 

Um, oh, it's a really tough one to answer that, uh, 'cause they've all been so good. But I have, uh, quite enjoyed derby. Um, it's terrain that haven't really ridden anywhere else before.

So all the stuff in Derby's pretty good, but, uh, the blue tear and, uh, bay of [00:01:00] Fires, um, it'd be right up there. 

Fantastic mate. I'd have to agree with you there. What's been one of the, the biggest things you've learned on this trip? I know we've been mixing in a little bit of coaching at each destination along the way.

Yep. 

Um, just going right back to basics, um, and sort of, yeah, riding over the years and not having any proper coaching experience before of developed a few bad habits. Um, so it's been good to iron them out and, um, yeah, run things back to basics and smoothing stuff out. Yeah, overall I think it's 

worked really well.

Fantastic, mate. Well, I'm excited to keep putting some of that into practice out here today. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Awesome. 

Guest Interviews: John from the UK

Okay, next up, we've got John here, John's. Hi, good morning. Jake coming to us from the UK. Absolutely. Originally from Scotland. Yeah, absolutely. John, what's been one of your favorite trails so far?

I, I, I think I share some of the, the thoughts of, of Thomas before, I loved the bay of fires.. Fires are just tremendous. Some of the jump lines here in Maydena are just spectacular [00:02:00] as well 'cause they're really nice and progressive. You can land really easy, but you can give you a little bit of pop off the top.

So I've really enjoyed that as well. It's really steep here, so you get plenty of speed coming in the corners. Fabulous, fabulous. Place. 

Fantastic, John. 

Guest Interviews: Bronson from Australia

Next up in the crew here we've got Bronson, fellow Australian coming to us from Newcastle. Newcastle, Bronson. You're actually a motocross coach, kind of newer to mountain biking in Yeah, yeah. Kind of first, uh, first big mountain bike trip.

What's been one of 

your favorite things so far? Definitely loving the mountain biking for starters, very, very new to it. Only just got a bike very recently and not much, uh, time on the wheels before coming here. But, um, it's been phenomenal having so many days in a row to just continually progress the skills and confidence and abilities and that, um.

Lots of carry over and transfer from the motocross over to the mountain biking, which does help. But, um, it is definitely a very much a beast in and of itself. [00:03:00] Um, still lots of learnings going on at the moment. Um, still, um, yeah, surprising myself with how much I, I can actually really send into, into stuff and the bike holds up better than I expect it to.

Um, but yeah, it's been a phenomenal experience and, um, learning so much off you as well. Um, the little quick whips of riding behind me and Oh, try this and instantly better. So, um, yeah, I would say I'm almost night and day, um, compared to when I come in here on day one to now, a hundred percent 

so cool, man.

It's been. Freaking awesome watching your progression over this last 10 days, and I think we went from like zero when we're getting into some, some green and some blue trails. On the first day there in Derby, we rode your first double black trail here in the Maydena Bike Park in the pouring rain yesterday.

Pretty fricking cool. 

Yeah. Yeah. No, that was awesome. 

Amazing, mate. Well, thanks for the words. Thank you. We'll get [00:04:00] out there and get some more. 

Okay. 

Guest Interviews: Euan from Scotland

We've got Euan here originally from Scotland joining us on this trip, uh, from his home base in Whistler, bc Ewen, what's been your favorite thing about the Tasmanian Mountain bike experience so far? 

It's a good question, Jake. Um, I like the variety. It's definitely a lot of variety of, of trails.

Love being in forests, different forests and the group that we're riding with. A lot of fun. It's a lot of fun on the bike, A lot of fun off the bike. 

Good trails, good people. Yeah. Hard to beat. Hey, I'm curious, you've obviously spent a lot of time in the Whistler bike park on the trails in the valley around Whistler.

What's been the biggest difference to the, the riding down here in Tassie compared to your home trails? 

Yeah, it's good. It's a good question. Obviously it's a bit smaller, but lower key, so you're shuttling up on a, in a van rather than a, a, a chair lift. I think, you know, the, the fundamentals are essentially the, the same steep, there's rocks, there's trails, there's berms.

It's a lot of, [00:05:00] a lot of fun. I think what I said to you before was, it's just. It's weird. It's the same but different because the fauna, uh, the flora, it's all, it's all different. A lot of fun. It's also for us, it's been very quiet, hasn't it? There's not been a lot of people at all on the, on the, on the trail.

So yeah, it's been a really fun experience. 

Yeah, I think we pretty much had the whole Maydena bike park to ourself yesterday, which was Friday. A few more folks here today, but, uh, for a busy day, it's really not that busy is it? It's 

interesting 'cause uh, the guys basically they were telling us that.

Uh, capped to 160 people for Maydena, which is obviously if you're a whistler, you're not familiar with the concept of a, of a cap. So it's, it's, it's pretty interesting in that regard too. 

Yeah. Fantastic. And one last question for you. We've been working on some skills throughout this trip. What's been the, the biggest thing that's stuck with you or that's been helping on the trails out here so far?

Yeah, I think like we [00:06:00] discussed before, can be just riding practice, practice, practice. I think the biggest. The thing is around, uh, some of the mental things we're talking about. So it's just helping center the, the focus to apply the skills you've learned. So I think as we discussed yesterday, that concept of exhaling, just before we were about to go on a feature like a a, I'm just.

Helps me set up my sort of routine going in and out, particularly with the, the braking zones and stuff like that. So yeah, that's worked really well. But just riding in a whole load of variety of trains and variety of weathers has really helped progress my mountain biking. 

Fantastic. Euan, thank you so much.

Now it's time to catch the first shuttle up and get into one big last day of riding here in Tasmania.

Main Interview: Mark and Brendan from Tailored Trails

Welcome back to the Mind Mountain Podcast. I'm stoked today. We're here for a special episode down here in Maydena in Tasmania on the back end of our Tasmania Mountain bike experience.

I'm here with Mark and Brendon from Tailored Trails. Local guiding [00:07:00] logistics, mountain bike experience experts, and we're here to talk mountain biking in Tasmania. Guys, welcome to the podcast. 

Thanks for having us, mate. Yeah, thanks mate. It's great to be here. Thanks for coming to Tassie. 

Hey man, it's been an absolute blast so far.

We've had four days in derby, three days out on the the rugged West coast. Real mix of weather. Now we're here in Maydena for endless Bike Park laps. Can't get enough of it. Um, fantastic. Why don't we start here? 

The Origin of Tailored Trails

Just telling us a little bit about you guys, maybe how you got into mountain biking and how Tailored Trails came to be here in Tassie

Yeah, for sure. Um, I'll kick off. Yeah. Me and mountain biking for, give or take 20 years, give or take. Um, yeah, and moved to Tasie about 10 years ago. Um, long story short, behind Tailored Trails was I had a group of mates come down from Queensland where I'm originally from, um, early days in Derby. This was about nine years ago, eight and a half years ago.

Did a trip to Derby, um, and fell in love with the place. Just some of the best [00:08:00] riding that I had ever done in Australia, in the Southern Hemisphere, to be honest. Um, did the trip, whole bunch of mates and on the last night of the trip we're sitting around the campfire, um, and thought, Hey, this is a pretty good business idea, isn't it?

We to do more of this? And at the time, there wasn't really anyone else doing it. So yeah, two years later, sort of bit the bullet and started the business. Um, and our primary offering is just basically, just all inclusive and full service tours around Tasmania. So our business is based out of Derby, you would say We're sort of out of the north of the state, but we are one of the only operators that go round all of the state and are licensed to operate on all of the big networks around Tassie.

Um, Tassie is just a mecca, like we are so blessed with phenomenal trails and so much diversity Down here you've got Blue Derby, premium flow, amazing trails, good fun, great. In any weather. You got the wild, rugged West coast, which you got to experience and it's full glory the day before yesterday. Um, and here we are at Maydena, which is just all about just good fun, [00:09:00] gravity, technical, descending, fast, flowy stuff.

Um, it's just amazing. So we are incredibly lucky. Um, we've been doing it for about seven years. We're coming up in seven years in January. Um, so we are pretty well experienced at this. We know the places to go. Um, and yeah, we just love. Having the chance to show people around this state. It's um, yeah, it's an absolute blessing.

Unreal. It's so cool to hear from dreaming around a campfire to here doing this full time. Yeah. Unreal. All good things happen around a campfire. We're sitting in front of the fire right now. It's when you make good decisions. Yeah, exactly right. 

Brendan's Journey to Tailored Trails

Brendo, tell us a little bit about you. We've been having lots of fantastic conversations in the van.

You've got a, a wealth of experience in the outdoors. But what first sparked your interest in mountain biking and then coming here to, to join Mark at Tailored Trails? 

Uh, yeah, long story. Um, yeah, started mountain biking. Uh, when I was, I started out in BMX, like a lot of kids. Um, started in BMX, wanted to get into racing, got into a lot of dirt jumping.

Didn't have a great racing scene [00:10:00] around me at the time. Um, got into dirt jumping and then some mates dragged me along on a mountain bike ride. I did the first ever mountain bike ride on the mega classic, um, Woodford to Glenbrook, um, the Oaks Fire Trail up in the Blue Mountains, did that on a BMX bike. That as my first ever mountain bike experience.

That was wild. Um, and then really humble beginnings of borrowing my brother's bikes. Riding anything we could. Mm. Um, and just borrowed those until I broke them and fixed them. And then, um, yeah. Really found a love for it through the back end of high school. When I first left high school, I, I got a job, um, told I, I lived off my first paycheck for a month and I took the next, I told my boss to hang on to my next three paychecks.

Yeah. Wow. 

And then I [00:11:00] took the next three paychecks straight to, um, Phantom Cycles in, uh, in Thirlmere. You're out there, Kerry. I appreciate you. Um, and that was it. Mountain biking became a thing. I, I dropped my next three paychecks at the bike shop, and that was it. I was hooked ever since. So, um, yeah, it's just been a, a, been a journey ever since.

Um, traveled around a lot. Lived in Scotland, lived in Morocco, ride, doing a lot of riding. Around all sorts of places. And then, yeah, came to Derby in 2019, um, and absolutely fell in love with it. Mm. And yeah, it was a, it was a life changing, life changing experience. Ended up packing up and moving down here and met Mark in Derby, um, and yeah, bought into the company and now we're running the show together, taking people to.

Not only all the big spots, the the Derby, the West Coast and Maydenas, but some of the little [00:12:00] in-between joints that, that you've got to experience with Penguin. Um, you know, um, places like, um, St. Helen's is a real little gem. Um, yeah, lots of those little in between joints that really make some of these tours pretty, pretty magic.

Mm, 

totally. I love that it's not just like three destinations to go mountain biking in Tassie. There's a, a wealth isn't there, and I'm just starting to understand just how much is down here. Mm-hmm. And even I guess on my first day, I, I flew in a day early to get over the jet lag and Mark was already saying, Hey, while you're in Launceston, there's actually some trails right there you can pedal to from the CBD.

And I was straight out there. It was fantastic. So I think I haven't rode a bad trail down here yet. 

Why Tasmania?

Um, but I'm curious, you know, you guys have obviously traveled around the world riding bikes adventure in why Tassie? What was it about Tassie that that grabbed your heart and really made you want to make a life here?

Um, the trails are magic. There's no doubt in that. Mm. [00:13:00] Um, the first time I rode in Tasia, or first time I rode in Derby, uh, was actually off the back of a trip to Whistler, Squamish, Pemberton, Moab and Virgin. Some big names there. Uh, and then came back and rode Tassie only a couple of weeks off the back of that trip, and was still blown away by it.

I thought, well, there's something in this. If I've had that benchmark set by those incredible destination trails, um, and I'm still falling in love with Tassie. There's something, it must be special, it must be real. Um, and then just the lifestyle, here's amazing. Um, it's, it's got. Everything that, everything that we could want.

There's, you can still buy fruit from a unmanned roadside stall. You don't get that in a lot of places these days. Um, and, and so it's got all, a lot of that, [00:14:00] that honesty and a, a bit of that sort of quaint, old timey, sort of like stepping back in time in some respect, some regards. Um, but then it's really progressive and modern and amazing as well.

I don't know. What was it for you, mark? 

Yeah, yeah, for me, um, I suppose two-pronged approach, but yeah, first and foremost, the lifestyle and just the people down here. Um, we sort of ended up here by chance, through a different career offering. And, um, didn't expect to live in Tassie to be quite honest, but pretty early on I was like, oh, this place is pretty special.

Um, Tassie's always had a bit of a stigma about it amongst Australians, particularly Australians based outta the northern end of the country, like myself. Um, I think there's a few furfies that people have been saying about Tassie just to keep it a little hidden secret for the last 30 or 40 years. 'cause this place is amazing.

Um, yeah, so for me as a young dad with a young family, like lifestyle is paramount here. It's just incredible. There's a certain like authenticity about this state and about the people and about the food and about the coffee, and about [00:15:00] the wine and the culture. And it's just, it's a really beautiful area.

Um, from a riding perspective, like it's it's next level, um, like it is genuinely world class across the state, um, we are really, really lucky. Um, but I suppose the thing that really tracks me to the riding is, um, just the, the fact that you are genuinely in mountain bike towns. Mm-hmm. Um, the difference between riding here and some big destinations in Australia and a little bit internationally as well, is you've got these huge tourism towns that kind of have a trail network.

Tacked onto the side, that might be a 10 or 15 minutes drive away. Um, whereas where we are now, we are about to jump on our bikes and pedal 350 meters and we're gonna chuck it on a shuttle and we're gonna go up to 1,120 meters and then do an 800 meter drop, 

and then we're gonna do it again 

and again and again.

Right. And again, and again. You're exactly right. Yeah. Um, so that's the thing I love about these towns down here is I don't have to stick my bike on a car and drive to the trail head. I literally roll outta the garage. Um, [00:16:00] and I'm at the trails, um, and that's pretty hard to come by. Um, so Derby and Maydena, even Queenstown, like all those places you can ride from your accommodation.

Um, so you don't need rental cars down here. You don't need all the hassles of having all that other kerfuffle that goes along with it. Um, it's tricky to travel down here, which is kind of what our business is based around because there's not a lot of infrastructure. It's a little bit hard to get around the area, but once you're in the towns, you're in the towns and you're there to ride your bike.

And there's a really cool feeling when there's more bikes doing wheelies up and down the main street than there is cars in the main street. That's what I love about it. You sort of feel like you're amongst your people. Yeah, it's really cool. 

I think you hit the nail on the head there, both of you. From what I've experienced so far this week anyway, it's, it's felt easy to travel.

Tassie, you know, a lot of the time we're leaving our bikes outside. We're not worried about them getting stolen. Mm-hmm. We're riding them to and from the trails. Like you say, there's an abundance of, of fresh, cheap local food drink. Everything's easy. Yeah. Thanks to you guys, you've kind of fill in the gaps and the [00:17:00] things that would usually be really hard logistically, the guiding, the transfers, the booking accommodation, the knowing where to eat, the, the list goes on.

Um, you guys are really making that easy for us. And I really liked, uh, one of your shuttle drivers in Derby, Caleb, he said. I'm not only living the dream, I'm a dream enabler. And I really see that in you guys as well. Right? That's Caleb. Yeah. You, you're living your dream. You're riding bikes for a living, but you're also enabling all of us to come from all around the world.

You know? We've got people from New Zealand, Australia, Scotland, Whistler, uh, the uk. Yeah. All coming here, living their dream riding bikes in Tassie. Thanks to you guys. 

Yeah, pleasure. So 

it kind of begs the question, I'm sure there's people out there thinking, yeah, I'd like to go to Tassie, but I wanna do it on the cheap.

Mm-hmm. 

 so yeah, I wanted to ask the obvious question that probably a lot of the dirt bag mountain bikers out there are thinking why not just do it yourself? 

Yeah, yeah. Good question Jake. Um, we are both dirt bag mountain bikers at heart 100% every day of the week.

We know both, so we are here. [00:18:00] Um, and I think I learned that firsthand about nine years ago when my mates came down. There's a bunch of us that, um, all flew down from the Sunshine Coast. Um, yeah, rented cars, drove out to Derby. I think we split across about three or four dual cabs to get the bikes in. Um, got out to Derby, jumped on the shuttles, booked accommodation, went out and had dinner.

Found somewhere to eat, like, did all the usual things, but. It was just really bloody hard. Um, like we're forever splitting costs and how much do you owe me and how much is he out for accommodation and did he buy the groceries? Or whatever the case might be. Um, and that's where the whole premise of the business came about was like, how do you get this genuinely incredible world class riding experience without all the hassles and kerfuffles along the way?

Mm-hmm. 

We just want someone to come down and have a good trip that's really easy, that's fairly priced, so that we can make money out of it and feed our families.

But then also, um, we want 'em to come back next year. Mm-hmm. the thing that I love more than anything about this is two thirds of our calendar every single year. Repeat visitation to the point where we've [00:19:00] got people out of seven years of operation are on their sixth trip.

Um, we had a crew down in September that were here in March and then they came back in September. Shout out to you boys in Sydney. Um, yeah, so that's really the thing we love about it. You get to know people quite well to point now, when I go back to Queensland, actually catch up with people that have been on trips with us.

Brendo goes back to Sydney. He catches up with people that he's met down here as well. Um. It's really exciting. So the difference between doing it yourself and the difference between doing it with us is not a financial thing. It's actually just a simplicity thing. Um, I think we make it fairly easy and that's kind of the premise of our business and our goal.

Um, and we want people to love it so much that you, you come back again next year 

and that speaks for itself, doesn't it? That you've got two thirds of your business is repeat business and then you've got customers that you actually wanna go and hang out with outside of work. Yeah. People that you now call mates.

I think that's really, really special. 

Yeah, it's pretty cool. Yeah. Yeah. Very blessed. 

Yeah. Fantastic. 

The Tasmanian Gravity Series

And kind of shifting gears here a little bit, obviously you guys are running around the state doing running tours [00:20:00] like this from well all season down here, but you're also running races. Tell us a little bit about the, the Tasmanian Gravity Series.

Yeah. That came about as a happy accident. 

Yeah. 

Love it. Um, yeah, we were, we wanted to get behind the Taz Gravity and Enduro series. Um, I've been racing a long time, um, and. I finally convinced Mark that a, that an Enduro was a, a great way to get out and ride. Um, and, and so we got out, we did it, and then we said, okay, well let's get behind the series.

Let's support it. Let's, let's throw some money behind it and, and get behind it. Um, and strangely that coincided with one of the organizers of the series also stepping away from the series. So we got in touch with the other guy that was half of the organizing team and just said, oh, look. Doug, what's going on with the series?

Is it gonna happen this year? He said, ah, I'd love to happen, but I can't do it on my own. And [00:21:00] so we sort of, and we waited and we, okay, what are we gonna do? Um, and then maybe over a few too many wines. One night we decided perhaps we should ask Doug what it's gonna take. Are we the right people to start running it?

We, we had a meeting, we had a cup of coffees and next thing it was on, we were, we were on. So we, um, ended up having to start a separate business. It's called Tas Gravity Events. We run that, um, with Doug Miller, who was originally, who started the series 10 years, 11 years ago now. Um, so he started that and, and yeah, we're a part of that.

Um, we just couldn't have Tassie not. Have a series a, a race series. Um, we, it's an incredible riding destination. There are so many good riders down here, a [00:22:00] real hotbed. We've got some incredible talent coming outta Tassie. We needed to foster that. But then also just that community of riders that a race series fosters, um, we couldn't see that go to waste.

Um, so yeah, it took it on and. As we sort of watched riders come up through, um, it took us, what have we, we've been doing it four years now. Fourth season. This is our fourth season. Yeah. Well, um, and you know, huge shout out to Lacey Adams who has come up through our series and went on to take the under Nineteens Enduro World Series Overall.

This year. Mm-hmm. So she's come home with a, with the, with the World Cup overall after coming up through our series. 

It's unreal when you can see that direct result of taking on that series and providing this platform for riders to come up through here. 

Yeah. I thought it might take 10 years. Mm-hmm. And maybe we'd see [00:23:00] something come of it, but Yeah.

But for that to happen so quickly and um, is amazing. 

Yeah. It's really cool and it kind of. For me, it touches on a bigger subject, which is kind of like purpose and our purpose here, working in the industry. We had a great chat in the van the other day kind of about how taking on this race series specifically has given you more purpose.

And you know, obviously we can talk about the riders that are coming through the series and getting onto the podium and that kind of thing. But even on a bigger level, talking about the, the kids that wouldn't have anything to do on the weekend if they didn't have an enduro To go and race. Yeah. Or they didn't have bikes to go and train on.

And I think it's really cool kind of getting a look around tasie. It seems like the, the state as a whole is kind of shifting from the primary industries, the logging, the old mining towns and stuff like that. And without things like mountain biking, tourism, there'd be nothing for the kids to do. Not nowhere for the people to work.

So I think it's really cool to see people like you stepping up and kind of filling those gaps, even though it's, it's a lot of work for you guys and it, it's pretty [00:24:00] hectic. Right. 

It's hectic. It's a lot of work, but it definitely, it gives a lot back and it gives a lot to the, to these rural towns. Yeah. You know, we're in Derby's Derby is a town of 106 people.

Mm. 

Um, Maydena's probably got two or 300 Derby's, an ex mining town, uh, Queenstown where we were. eX mining Town still has a little bit of mining in that area. Um, Maydena, where we are, X forestry. Town, there's still forestry going on, but there used to be big forestry works right here, and that's shut down.

Mm-hmm. Uh, and the bike park has become a big, um, employer, uh, for the area. Um, and, but apart from that just brings huge amounts of money to the area. Mm-hmm. Um, and that happens through tourism, but, but the races are actually a, a form of tourism themselves. Um, we actually. Made the decision a few [00:25:00] seasons ago to release the courses.

Traditionally in an Enduro race, you release the course, maybe the, the Tuesday or Wednesday in the run up to the Saturday, Sunday race. Um, we decided to release it two weeks out and that gave people, number one, gave people the opportunity to practice, but also it gives the towns an opportunity to actually host people.

Over three consecutive weekends. Mm. So people can actually, we'll, we'll see people. Um, the first year that we did that, there was a, a group that Tas Gravity Girls, which is a, a not-for-profit that runs down here in Tassie, a women's riding crew. Uh, they organized a trip out to Queenstown two weeks before the race so that they could get out there and practice two weeks before.

Then they did some coaching and training and, and group riding focusing on the skills that they would need the weekend before the race. They did [00:26:00] that, they did that at home, um, and then they went out and 

raced the following week. That's so great. It's, for me, it really speaks to kind of taking the pressure off and making enduo racing more approachable Yeah.

For newer riders and kind of setting riders up for success. Yeah. I think that's great. 

And that's what we wanna do. 

Yeah. There's no reason to, to make it harder than it needs to be or to, to put more pressure on just for the sake of adding pressure. Mm-hmm. End of the day, I think most riders start riding because it's fun.

They start racing because it's fun. So I love that you are thinking about, you're not kind of rigid and this is how Enduro races work. 

How's our Enduro race want to work? How do we want it to work? Yeah. Yeah. It's an amazing community. Mm. I I think that it's, it gives a lot of people a really great excuse to get out.

Maybe, you know, groups of friends who perhaps wouldn't make time to get together and ride somewhere unusual, especially if they're live far apart. Mm. But they meet through our series, and then they, they, they put that time aside because, because that race becomes the purpose and a [00:27:00] really good excuse to get out there and do it.

That's unreal and I love kind of touching on the coaching point a little bit there. 

Coaching and Skills Development

We've been working with a, a group of mere mortals, myself included, not so much in Duro races this week, but we've been doing a bunch of coaching as well. Not only, you know, guiding the riders from around the world on the trails here in Tassie, but also getting them up to speed and ensuring that they can really.

Live the full experience of mountain biking and in Tassie and perhaps ride the trails that they'd been watching on YouTube and kind of, yeah, ride to their full potential. So touching on a whole bunch of different skills, but obviously you guys see riders all season long coming from all around the world.

I'm really curious what's, what's maybe like the one or two skills or things you find yourself teaching riders the most that are coming here landing in Tassie and needing a little tuneup? 

Um, I find.

I find a lot, it depends on where they come from. Mm mm Um, we, so there's an area just north of Sydney. [00:28:00] Uh, Sydney is a big sandstone bowl and there's an area just north of Sydney where there's an incredible amount of trail being built. Uh, it's very rocky. It's very technical. Their building materials are sandstone or sand.

So. Jank, Rocky, gnarly stuff they've got Mm. Berms not so much. What? So, so you put them on some of the hardest, most technical trails that we've got, and they eat 'em for breakfast, put them on the, the, even the easier flowier trails. Mm-hmm. And it. They make a ham sandwich of it. Not all, but some. Yeah. Um, and is it the speed not used to?

Um, it's, it's speed. It's cornering technique. It's, it's certain things. They just want a little brush up, whereas people who perhaps live in areas where there's a lot more flowy [00:29:00] biy flow trail, they might need to learn how to bend their elbows a bit better. Through rocks. Yeah. Or, or loosen up through some jank.

Yeah. So, um, yeah, it depends. You've seen something similar. 

Oh, a hundred percent. Yeah, it's um, it's really interesting this far into it. You can tell by talking to someone on the phone before they come down from a trip, you kinda gotta kind of get a sense of what kind of their rider they're going to be based on where they ride.

Mm-hmm. Um, and we are pretty fortunate that between Brendo and I, we, we've ridden the whole entire east coast of Australia, most of South Australia. Um, and little bits around wa so we understand Sydney, Southeast Queensland. Um, Adelaide Trails really work really, really well. And the riders are almost a little bit taught by the terrain that there is on their backyard.

So yeah, you've answered that and hit the nail on the head. Um, yeah. I'd say like the biggest thing that we are always kind of talking about a little bit is just, just general body position. Um, like our biggest market is kind of 35 to 55 year olds. Um, you know, that's kind of the [00:30:00] market that travel with their bike and.

We get a lot of empty nesters. We get a lot of young families. We get a lot of big families. That might be mom and dad and four kids that do a trip with us, which is just amazingly good fun for us as well. Um, but the most beneficial thing that we see, um, and it's kind of something that we are trying to foster in the mountain bike industry in Tasmania a little bit, is when you come down here, just get a little brush up lesson.

Mm-hmm. Uh, it's amazing. Spend four hours with this guy on the trails on day one, and it will change your riding for the next four days. And it's a bit of a foreign concept in the mountain biking industry in Australia so much. It might be a little bit different in your neck of the woods, but we find when people go to Perisher or Hotham or Threadbow and do a five day ski trip, more often than not, they'll get a little coaching lesson on day one.

And that's kind of the norm. Um, it's amazing if you can do that when you come to Derby and spend four hours just brushing your skills up, you get so much more out of the next three to four days. Um, so that's something we've been working pretty hard on. For the [00:31:00] last three years. And we're slowly starting to find that now with a lot of our repeat guys.

It's almost like a hay locking that day, one half day on the trails, um, just as a regular thing, year round, year round, year round. Um, and it's incredibly beneficial. Um. Our goal is that you come down, you have a bloody good time and you really enjoy your trip, but you also go home and more confident, um, more inspired rider.

Totally. And it's definitely what we've seen on this trip, isn't it? Having, uh, coaching not only from you guys, for myself as well, and not only on that first day, but each new place we go. And it's not necessarily always a traditional coaching lesson where we're in a skills park and we're spending four hours hiking up and down a one corner.

Mm-hmm. But each time as we go, there's questions popping up and there's people getting it. There's GoPro footage being reviewed each night. Mm-hmm. It's really cool just seeing how the, the riders grow just from those little tidbits of, of information and, and feedback they're getting along the way. Yeah.

I think, like you said, it's been. Well, pretty advanced group we've had this week. Um, strong, intermediate, advanced riders. We've been riding a mix of kind of, you [00:32:00] know, dark blue or stout blue, as Brendon likes to say. Um, some black diamond trails, little bit of double black in there as well. And each one of these riders has really like stepped it up.

If they came in as a blue rider, they're now right. Black trails. And it's been so cool to see. And like, I can't even remember what day it is, but I think today's like day nine or something like that. Yeah. Uh, we've pretty much rode every, every day there. Um. But yeah, like you said, it's not always the, the shiny skills on top of our skills pyramid.

Quite often the, the riders that have got like, or what they've needed the most has been just a brush up on the foundations. Yeah. And we've really seen that huge leap forward because of that. Yeah. Yeah. 

The Importance of Lessons in Mountain Biking

I also kind of found what you're saying their interesting, I see that as well a lot in the sense that.

Perhaps the riders over in Canada that are used to go into Whistler and getting ski lessons are a lot more ready to come and get a bike lesson. It makes sense, right? Yeah. If you get taught to ski, you should get taught to bike. Yeah. Um, I see a little bit of this where I'm from in Australia as well.

We've got maybe more of that kind of farming DIY background of [00:33:00] like, ah, I know how to ride a bike. Yeah. I've been riding bikes for years. Yeah. Um, I was one of those guys up until my, what, early twenties when I got my first lesson and kind of realized how much I didn't know. Yeah. Um, but yeah, like you said, get a lesson, it'll pay dividends.

It'll be the, the cheapest investment you ever make in your, your new bike. Yeah. When we compare it to what we spend on a modern mountain bike these days. Yeah. 

Yeah. It's a pretty great, oh, sorry. It's a pretty great souvenir to take home. Totally use some skills much 

better than the bark off the elbows, the alternative, right?

Yeah. That's, it'll, it will look after that. 

Diverse Terrain and Its Benefits

And, and a bit like what you said, we've, we've got such an incredible array of, um, different terrain here. Um, and the terrain teaches you how to ride and because we've got such an amazing terrain, uh, variance of terrain, we've got some fun steep stuff in Derby, but, but.

Maydena's got incredible steeps. If you wanna learn very big steeps, we've got it here. If you wanna learn how to [00:34:00] ride, um, you know, looser, sort of less packed dirt. We've got heaps of that in Queenstown. If you wanna learn how to ride rock. There's just so many different types of it here. So it's such a playground for, for learning and coaching and teaching.

It's, um, it's pretty amazing 

paradise. Eh? You said something really cool the other day. You kind of. 

Maximizing Descending Experience

You mentioned that some riders that live in a place with less elevation will come here to a place like Maydena and do a year's worth of descending in three days. Yeah. 

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We, um, we get a crew down.

They come down at least once a year. Um, they're down from Alice Springs and Yeah, Alice Springs pretty flat. Yeah. And, and it astonishes me how good these lads are at descending. Considering how little of it they've got and how hard they've gotta work for it. But yeah, they'll do, they might do 300 meters of de descending in a week.

Yeah. Wow. Uh, if they get out on the bike twice a week, they might [00:35:00] get 300 meters of des descending. We're gonna do 800 meters of lap. Yeah. Uh, we'll get six laps in today. 

It's mind boggling, isn't it? It's a lot. Yeah. It's a lot. So, um, unreal. I'm getting excited looking out the window here. 

Weather and Trail Conditions

I know we had what, 20 more rain forecast today.

It's currently not raining. No, we're in for a treat. It's looking good. Yeah, I think it's, I think it's 

gonna clear it. And even if it does rain, um. Maydena loves a bit of rain. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Um, everywhere that we've ridden, you've, I mean you've seen it rain in in all the spots. Yeah. Which is a bit unseasonal for November.

We've also seen at 

least a patch of sun shine in all the spots. Yeah. I think like derby was like, it was a treat for me coming from cold dark Canada that's about to start snowing to derby 'cause it was blue skies every day. It was nice warm weather, but also not too warm to pedal. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah. So I think, yeah, we've been really lucky with the, with the weather.

It's kind of that springtime hero dirt, isn't it? It's, yeah, just enough rain to keep the trails tacky, but not so much that they're muddy. It's unreal. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

The Role of Local Guides

I guess too, that's where having a local [00:36:00] guide helps out. There are trails, there are areas that, that handle the rain better, and I'm sure that's, that's everywhere.

Um, we can, we can kind of point in the right direction and go, Hey, look, it's really hosing down. There are trails, you know, 23 stitches at Derby. Doesn't love the rain. 

No. 

Um, but Kings Wall perfect. And that's hard to see. Trail Forks doesn't tell you that, that's for sure. Having a bit of a guide, having a local help definitely helps that, and that pays dividends.

That's what's been really cool for me and the crew. Obviously I came down here with all these ideas of what I wanted to coach these guys. I had a, a chat with each of them on the phone, taking all their information beforehand, kind of checking in. But I didn't know where to take them to actually teach that.

So it's been really cool collaborating with you guys. I mean like, Hey, where are the best corners for teaching trail braking today? And it's just stuff we, we wouldn't be able to do without you guys, and it wouldn't be as easy. I think like a lot of my audience and a lot of the people watching, they, they're growth [00:37:00] focused or progression focused mountain bikes.

They want to get better. They want to get the most out of this sport. And I love the idea of bringing people somewhere different because like you're saying, when we're not only getting used to the same type of dirt or the the same sandstone rock that's at home, we're getting to ride three very different places in 11 days.

Traveling to Improve Skills

And I'm curious to hear your perspective, like how does traveling the world on a mountain bike make you a better rider? 

Um, I, I guess the easiest way to put it is. If you're gonna ride dirt, if I'm, if I'm coaching somebody in certain skills. Um, in Derby you learn how to maintain speed and to generate speed because it's a little bit more of a trail park.

And in Maydena you learn how to manage it. 

Nice. 

Yeah. And, and that's in a nutshell, by going to different places like that, you get a, a totally different [00:38:00] skill set. Mm. Um. That's not to say Derby's flat and Maydena's mental, um, and crazy steep. Um, there's, there's plenty of spots in Derby where you're really managing your speed.

But, but on a whole, you get a lot out of derby if you can. If you can pump and you can play and you can, and you can hold, hold cer, hold speed through certain areas, um, there's a lot there to play with. A much steeper hill with, you know, it's definitely got some genuine green trails on it. Um, and they are genuinely green.

They, you can take kids down the hill. Mm-hmm. Um, but, but you are learning to manage your braking a lot more here. You're learning to manage, um, manage that speed, control that speed a little bit more. Mm-hmm. And, and that's the, that's sort of the. In a nutshell, breaking down [00:39:00] those two different spots. Yep.

Um, yeah, if you're, so yeah. 

Becoming a more diverse rider by going into different environments, different types of trails, and learning to ride that terrain. 

Yeah. We find, I find with a lot, I don't know if you have seen the same, but we find a lot of people on day about lunchtime on day one, if they've ridden generally Australians.

They'll come to Maydena and by lunchtime on day one they're saying, oh, the, the blues here are a black anywhere else. Mm-hmm. And then once they get the swing of it, once they learn.

That it's just steep, not harder, it's just steeper. Once I get swing of riding steep stuff by the end of day one and kicking off into day two, they're realizing it. They flick the switch, they go, okay, it's not harder, it's not gnar, it's just steeper and it's a different type of riding. Mm. So for a lot of people, [00:40:00] Australians, generally we, our trails are a little bit flatter.

Yep. Um, and. And once you get the hang of that steepness Yeah. You're off to the races. 

I love it. And that just like really speaks to a trip like this, isn't it? Where we can speed up that whole process and maybe that awkward first day where we're not quite sure and everything feels too hard and it's maybe a bit overwhelming.

Mm-hmm. It's like, come here and learn which trails are the best to ride, learn exactly how to ride them, and really get into that fun zone a lot faster. That's what we're seeing with a lot of our riders, isn't it? We had some of the guys that, uh, perhaps come from a, a place like maybe we've got one rider from Wellington here and she preferred the steep tech.

Um, we've got others from Whistler that love the jumps, and now we've got this group of riders that love both because we've, we've given, we've filled those gaps and we've, we've taught them how to ride both we've confidence and control. It's really cool to see. Really rewarding.  

Mindset and Overcoming Fear

I wanted to touch a little bit here on mindset.

I know that's something I. Really like to talk about and it's like we've had a, a lot of great conversations about with our guests and [00:41:00] with each other in the van. We actually did a little bit of a mental skills workshop before we got into the, the steep and deep on our first day in Maydena yesterday. Um, Brendo, I'll let you kick it off 'cause I know you brought up a, a really cool strategy that you use and that you coach.

Would you share it on the podcast? 

Yeah, yeah. It's, um, it's something I've thought about a lot over time and, and it was something I really struggled with. I, um, I. The, a lot of people work with visualization. Um, that's actually something I struggle with owing to having Aphantasia, which is a, a lack of a visual imagination.

Mm. Um, but it's, I, I work a lot more on, on feeling with things. Um, we were looking at a feature with a bunch of our riders, um, kookaburra Rock on a, on a trail called Cuddles. Mm. It was in the, the Enduro World Series. It's this incredible, you've got three different lines down these incredibly, this quite steep granite boulder.

[00:42:00] Um, 

for those that are listening, this, this thing rivals Squamish whistler riding grippy granite rock. It's what like how tall is it? 12 meters tall? Uh, yeah. Near vertical. It's bloody unreal. Yeah. Sorry, go on. Yeah. Yeah. 

The, a line A line's 12 meters and. Fairly vertical. I got so excited 

when I seen that rock.

Yeah. And all the rock in Derby really? Yeah. 

Yeah. No, it's an incredible feature. And, and, but having that Aline is amazing. Uh, having a bee and a C line on the same trail, incredible, incredible work from the trail builders and, and obviously the, the natural train lended itself to, to doing that. Mm-hmm. So, um, having that, that C line's quite intimidating.

The run-ins a little weird. And it actually dips to a horizon line where you can't see the rundown. The rundown is actually relatively mild, super grippy, quite wide, and, and I'd say it's a feature that any [00:43:00] blue trail, any rider that's riding blue trails with confidence could actually run that line. No problems at all.

The scary part is the horizon line. You get to a point. And right at the point where you hit a bit of a tree root and look up to see where the end all you can see, is it dropping away into the never, never. Mm-hmm. Um, and what a lot of people will do in that point is they'll, they'll look at it, they'll look at the run out, they'll look at that, run down, uh, down that, um, granite slab.

They'll forget to really think about the run in and the point where they get really scared. 

Mm. 

And so what I've started doing with people is actually walking them back further, further and further, and actually getting them to walk through the run-in, get to the point where they would look up at that [00:44:00] drop off into nowhere and.

Understand and feel and prepare themselves for that point. Mm-hmm. Where they get really scared. That real pucker moment. Yep. Where you go that point where you want to hit the brakes. That point where you want to do all the intuitive things mm-hmm. That aren't actually going to serve you. 

Yep. 

Um, and I get them to actually practice that moment of terror and then release it.

Mm-hmm. And if you can practice that fear. And then that bit of a breathe out, it's gonna be okay. And if you can get through that two or three meters, you actually get to the point where you can then see down it and then it's fine. And we've found great success with people doing that thing that they can actually, they know they can achieve the thing.

It's just quite scary. Um, 

yeah. Getting through that point of commitment. 

Yeah. 

Such [00:45:00] an interesting one, isn't it? 'cause often that fear or that pucker moment, as you said, doesn't come up on the, the steepest part or the hardest part of the feature. It comes up just before it, just as we're about to go in. So if we can actually.

Get comfortable with that feeling. Like you say, not just visualize how it's gonna look, but also feel how it's gonna feel. Sit there, get a little bit more comfortable with that, and almost train ourself to move through that moment rather than just try to block it to the side of trying to pretend it won't happen when we actually are on our bike.

Yeah. Really, really acknowledging that point of, of, okay, I'm going to get scared here. Yeah. 

And that's okay. 

Yeah, 

that's good. I means I'm challenging myself. Yeah, 

absolutely. Yeah, it was something I thought it was. It happened to me, um, in Whistler, looking at the Moon Booter. Okay. Yeah. Dropping into that enormous bowl.

And you're just seeing this, it looks like a 10 story building of dirt. Yeah. And you just go, oh. And you're like, I'm meant to launch up there, to go up there, and I have to not break between here and there. Yeah. And everything in your body is telling you just a [00:46:00] little, little break tap or something for comfort and, and your, your thinking brain knows that that's not the right thing to do.

Um, but some part of you just wants to get on the break and mm-hmm. But just have that moment. Yeah. Practice that moment and feel that moment of fear and, and then release. Let it release and, and commit in and Yeah. And 

when you say release, are you exhaling out? 

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's something. And it's whatever works for people.

Mm. For a lot of people I do find a lot of people hold their breath. Yeah. So definitely for a lot of people, I'm finding that, that exhale Mm. Is a, is a big thing that helps 'em through. Um, for some people it's, it's in their shoulders and in their neck. 

Right. Releasing that muscle tension. 

Yeah. And, and trying to identify that.

I'll, I'll try to identify that, or I'll try to get them to identify what it is that, that they're hang where they're holding on. 

Yeah. 

Uh, get them to try to release that and, and feel that on the walkthrough. 

Yeah. 

Um, and then. And then [00:47:00] let him have it on a bike. 

Yeah. Fantastic mate. I, I loved watching you coach one of our riders through that process.

It was so beautiful to see and just that high five moment afterwards. It's so cool. Oh, it's magic. I love it so much. Fantastic. And what about for you, mark, have you got any kind of wide open, but on the mental side of mountain biking, is there any kind of like tools, tips, techniques, or things that work for you in your riding?

I know you've like, uh, progressed a lot yourself since moving here to Tassie and exploring this terrain. 

Yeah. Yeah, it's an interesting way, like I've got a very different background, um, yeah. Coming from sort of motocross in my younger years and then more into XC and adventure racing, so, um. I come from that, um, more peddling up than peddling down kind of background.

Uh, and Tasie was a, like, it was a completely different mindset. Um, I'd bought a new bike within the first six months and I was wearing different clothes and different shoes and everything that goes with that. So, party 

shirt on, ready to rip, eh? 

Yeah. The best riding shirts you can buy, aren't they? They're so good.

Um, but yeah, probably from a different perspective, and I only say [00:48:00] this 'cause we're in Maydena and it's kind of fresh of mine. 

Building Confidence in Maydena

It's really interesting when you drive into Maydena from a mindset perspective, like this place has a reputation, um, and in some ways deserved this. So, but in also in other ways, um, it doesn't deserve the reputation that it's got.

Like it's actually got some of the most diversity in the country and probably the world as well, like, kudos to the team at this bike park. They've done a phenomenal job. But yeah, in the first couple of years, like it, it was probably a little bit more focused around the steep and rowdy stuff, but. You can almost pick it when you drive into Maydena.

So we're coming in, whether we've come from Hobart Airport to Derby, and when you just go past the National Park Hotel and you come through this nice little rainforest csection, all the banter in the car goes from da, da, da. Good time. Good time. It's just everything. Quiet and down a little bit. And there's the next 10 minutes.

Everyone's really quiet. And you can feel the nerves building and we kind of stick the right music on and try and change that a little bit. 'cause we [00:49:00] know it's coming. It happens with every single group. Um, and from a mindset perspective, that's because they've jumped on YouTube and they've watched all the Rowdy Trails and they've watched Hard line and they build this place up to be so much.

Um, so the day one that we do with people here, which is what we're gonna go and do now with you guys, is all just about building confidence on the terrain without kind of overthinking it. So we do a lot of our coaching and our pre-coaching and our guiding in Derby to understand people. And then our goal at Maydena day one here is, Hey, just jump on my wheel.

We're gonna have some fun. And the goal is to push people sort of within their comfort zone, but every now and then, just slightly beyond it. But in a perfect world scenario, I really love the fact when you ride a trail and someone looks back up and goes. I can't believe I just did that. 

Mm. 

But the thing is they didn't even notice they were doing it 'cause they were just trusting the wheel in front of him.

They were on it and they were in. Um, and we've had people here that like admittedly probably might have been a little bit outta their depth. Um, [00:50:00] and there's one person I remember in particular, he might know who he is, um, he's early sixties, um, comes down every year with a group and we been do doing derby for four or five years.

And I said, boys, let's go to Maydena this year. And one of the lads in the group, the older guy, um, lovely guy, really capable rider, we'd done a run and a half, I think it was, and he's, we're halfway down, we're at midline. He sort of put me aside and said, mark, this is a bit much for me, mate. I'm just gonna, I'm gonna pull out after this one.

And I said, gimme another run. Gimme two lunchtime, let's see where we get to. We are just gonna keep working on this and jump on my wheel and let's have some fun. And we didn't talk too much about everything, but it was just about building his confidence for the next hour. And then by two, three o'clock in the afternoon, I remember getting to one particular junction and it's like, I won't say his name 'cause he might be out there, but let's call him John.

It's like John Black. Blue, your choice. And he looked at him, me, and he's like, black. Oh yeah, we're dropping in. All right, jumping in, we're going in. And we went rogue King Brown, which is one of my [00:51:00] favorite trails here. She's a proper steep tech flow trail. It's amazing and absolute work of art. Um. But that was do just about building his confidence throughout that day to get him to that point, to be able to ride that trail and not only ride it, but actually ride it confidently.

Mm. Um, and the other thing we encounter all the time when people come to Tasmania is you get this text message like 3, 4, 5 days later from someone that just went back to Northern Beaches Sydney, or to Newcastle or to Adelaide, and they go, Hey, I just did this feature on my trail that I've been looking at for seven years and I've never ridden.

That's the big thing. Coming back to your previous question about like traveling on your bike. When we ride the same network three times a week, we kind of talk ourself into what we ride. 

Yeah. 

Um, so there might be a feature that you've been looking at that you go, that's not in my wheelhouse. Um, and then you come down here and ride something here, whether it be Kookaburra Rock or King Brown or something at Queenstown, something at Penguin.

Um, and you go back home and it's like, oh, this is a piece of cake. Yeah. I've got this. So. [00:52:00] That's the fun part of the job. 

It's so special, isn't it? Not only getting to help riders here in Tassie, but that that work or that effort that they've put in down here continues on when they get home. Yeah. And like you say, it can shed a whole new light on someone's local trail network as well.

Yeah, 

and not only, I guess, like creating more diversity in someone's riding. A lot of the riders we've got here are from. Living in the northern hemisphere like me. So we're actually expanding our riding season by coming down here and Yeah, getting some extra trails in. Yeah. Um, so it's a great way of, instead of having a mountain biking season, it's like screw that mountain bike all year round.

Yeah. Yeah. So really cool. I love what you were saying there too, about a place kind of developing a persona and we can like. A lot of us had never visited Maydena before, but we knew it was steep and deep. Yeah. And exactly like you said, as we're driving through the valleys there we go from enjoying the view to say, oh, these hills are, geez, these hills are sea.

There's big trees, there's roots everywhere. We see the rocks in the forest. It's like, oh wow, this is the real deal. Yeah. And the nerves can start to come up before we [00:53:00] even get on the bike. Yeah, so it was really special yesterday. Obviously like today's like day one of, of shuttles and bike park here in Maydena, but we actually snuck down a little bit early.

We had some froths in the group, so got out on our rest day, did a little pedal on some of the lower mountain trails, a little bit of, uh, yeah, skills tune in, and it was a really great way of calming some of those nerves. Yeah. And getting people fired up, getting people excited for today rather than feeling overwhelmed by it.

So really thankful to have you have you guys here for that and kind of creating that experience as well. Mm-hmm. It's been such a, a welcoming, fun vibe for the duration of the trip. Mm-hmm. Rather than a, oh, I'm not sure about this vibe. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And I think like each one of the, the guys and girls in our group would say they've probably rode things this week that they didn't think they'd ride coming into it.

Yeah, for sure. Really special. It's almost time for the, uh, the bike park to open. So we'll get moving in a second. We're gonna do a break pad check. Make sure everyone's good to go. Make sure bikes are safe for today. But before we wrap things up, is there anything that you guys wanted to talk about on this [00:54:00] podcast that we haven't touched on yet?

Um, no. I think it's been great. Thanks for coming down, Jake. It's been absolute pleasure. Like this has been in the works for a year and a half. Um, lot of chats on the phone, lot of video calls from the other side of the world. Um, but yeah, what you do over in your neck of the woods is absolutely amazing and it's been an absolute pleasure to work with you, not only in the lead up, but while you're here.

Um, great bunch of people. It's really amazing when you get, um, six or seven people from different parts of the world, um, and the first couple of hours where everyone's kind of finding each other and understanding. But the dynamic amongst this group is absolutely incredible, and that's your work in finding the right people and the pre-chat and getting to understand people, which has been absolutely brilliant.

Come to Tassie ride bikes, it's heaven down here, whether that be with us, whether that be with someone else, like just get down there and ride bikes. Um, it's a pretty special part of the world, which is why you're sitting here with a Queenslander and a New South Welshman and a Victorian and our race family here.

And yeah, like it's just a really cool part of the world, but, and a Victorian, yeah, you're right. Yeah. [00:55:00] Um, yeah, it's an amazing place down here. So. Come and get amongst. 

Ah, thank you mate for the kind words, like I say. Well, it's been a pleasure working with you, both of you guys from the start as well. And yeah, we first got talking a year and a half ago, so this has been a, a dream for us in the making for a while now.

It feels so fucking cool to be sitting here having made it happen. Yeah, we're just lapping it up the last couple of days of bike park here. Um, but yeah, right from the moment we got on that first Zoom call, I was like, right, these are my guys. They're gonna help me make this dream happen. And it's been like that at every step along the way.

Yeah. Um, really, like it's been, I guess, no compromises for me. Everything that I've wanted for this trip. You've been like, yep. Let's make it happen. Yeah. And adjustments along the way, different trails, different things. I, I feel like it's been this shared vision and it, it's so yeah. So fucking cool working with you guys.

Yeah. That's something we really push hard for. We, we are mountain bikers at heart. Mm. We are mountain bikers every day of the week. And. That's the, that's the beautiful part of [00:56:00] what we do is, is we just put together exactly the tour that we would wanna be on. Mm-hmm. And so that in a way, makes it the easiest job in the world.

Yeah. It's like, what would I want now? I'd wanna ride a trail like this, and then what would I want after that? A beer. And a really good meal. Okay. We can organize. So we just organize that. We just organize what we would want. Yeah. And, and we're, we're pretty mountain bikes. We're pretty simple folk generally.

Um, and, and yeah, we just put the time into finding the best stuff. Um, yeah, we find the best houses, the best meals. We, we know the spots that are not so good. There's a few out there. Um, and, and we just. Put the time into finding the stuff that's great. The trails that are great. Mm-hmm. Um, it's arduous research, you know, checking out trails and tough beers and restaurants and, you know, that sort of thing.

But yeah. Someone's gotta do it there. Yeah. We've got a strong research and development team that, um, that work tirelessly to keep [00:57:00] the, you know, making sure that it's, uh, the, the levels kept high. Mm-hmm. Um, and, and yeah, we just love saying yes if, if people want to do something. Um, that's a little, even if it's a little bit off the cuff, we've, we've got a crew that comes down every year, they do a golf day in the middle of their mountain bike tour.

Um, we're often taking people and, and for little detours to visit, whether it's wineries or distilleries or, or go wake boarding or, you know, all those sorts of things would, they're all on offer. They're all on the cards. So, um, and then, yeah, any sort of mountain bike adventure. If, if people want to. Um, do big pedal days, we can do it.

Private shuttle days are, are obviously our bread and butter, but yeah. Uh, yeah, whatever it is, we're just. Wanna make it happen. 

That's it. Hey, we had one of, one of our guys who rent an e-bike. We won't name names 'cause we don't wanna call him out as being an e-biker, but, uh, yeah, it's kind of, you make things happen, right?

He was sick of pedalling, so we got [00:58:00] him on an e-bike for the day and he was much happier. Um, yeah, it's, it's been awesome. 

The Benifits of Joining a Hand Picked Group on a MTB Trip

And I think that's the, the really cool thing about this trip that we've put together is we're riding with people that we ride with anyway. We're not only like. Opened up 10 spots and just let anyone book on we, we curated those people and we picked the right people.

Not only are they all at a similar skill level with similar goals, we've got a similar vibe as well. And I think that's a special thing. You know, we've got people who have vastly different ages living in different countries, different mountain biking experience's, different genders, and they're all best friends now.

And it, it's so cool, isn't it, when we can sit and chat in front of the bus and the crew's just there on one laughing and chatting in the back. It's really special. Yep. 

Yep. Yeah, it's unreal. We, we see that a lot. Whether, whether it's with our shared tours where it's a, you're just buying one seat on the bus or, or, or our group packages where it is a group of mates who are, who have been riding together and, and have all booked together to, to book a private tour.

Mm-hmm. Um, yeah, [00:59:00] just that comradery over the time, um, learning from each other and learning from each other's skills and, and just spending that amount of time, the volume on the bike. And the volume of time together, it's really special. It grows some incredible friendships and. Um, and some, yeah. Wild times.

Totally. And it's been great for me as a coach too, like working with two other expert coaches. I know I've learned things from each of you on this trip. Things you're saying to our, our riders, our guests on the trip. Hey, I might try that myself. It's so cool. Kind of. Yeah. Trading tools and inspiring each other.

Yeah. That's gone 

both ways. I can assure you. My, my mental notepad's been working overtime. It's been awesome. So thanks for that. Fantastic. 

Great. I love it. 

Conclusion and Future Plans

Um, for anyone listening to this that wants to check out the Tasmanian Mountain Bike expedition, we're gonna be hitting the ground running for 2026.

Yeah, it's gonna be, uh, very late October into early November next year, gonna get this hero dirt, sunshine again. Um, for anyone interested in checking out that there'll be a link down [01:00:00] in the show notes. And applications will likely be open by the time we release this podcast. So yeah, we'd love to hear from you if you're interested.

We'd love to tell you all about it. Um, with that being said, let's go hit the trails guys. Thanks so much. Okay, let's do it. Thanks, legend. 

Nice one, mate. 

Cheers guys. 

See you next year.