I spotted a tweet, almost by chance, for a skills clinic being offered by none other than Conrad himself. My mountain bike signed us up as he feels he is as good as Conrad’s bike ( both are red, black and white – mostly). Who was I to object?

We checked tyre pressure and set up before heading out. It became immediately apparent the passion that Conrad has for riding. Liezel was a superb wing woman who bandaged bloody knees, fetched pumps, arranged drinks and snacks and took the odd action pic. All I between shouting encouragement to us (not the Caveman)

After practicing on some level ground we attempted a short single track section, hand built Caveman style. A few laps later we all felt pretty good about our selves. Only to see the master descend and realise that we had at least 10 000 more hours to go!

We headed to some more single track and I tried to implement the lessons. “Attack Position” is all I thought while my body still followed old bad habits.

Yesterday, a week later I headed to Tokai to practice or as Conrad calls it “play”. I am reading Brian Lopez’s book and feel like I have only touched the surface.

I look forward to practicing more and seeing improvements. I am so psyched to improve my riding and my time at Grabouw next year. However I feel I have the tools to improve. Now it is just down to LOADS of hard work getting these skills dialled into the body.

I truly hope that Team Stoltz continue and expand on these courses and clinics going forward. I think they should be mandatory for any mountain biker. 

I wish Conrad and Liezel all the best in polishing this product as I think there is a real future for their offering and in so part with the knowledge to help improve so many of us. We as a mountain bike community need the older guys (sorry more experienced) to share their knowledge. This will build the new generation!