Dan Hugo and Mari Rabie wins XTERRA South Africa

Monday, February 22nd, 2010

Good stuff- read Dan’s report here
Amber was 4th in the Ladies’. More later…

Mr XTERRA is in town!

Monday, February 1st, 2010

Er, make that “was”…
Will Kelsay and his lovely lady, Shelby, visited South Africa for a few weeks. They spend a few days in Cape Town, then a few days in my house in Stellenbosch before tackling the Garden Route.
I’m busy renovating my house and of course,they got roped into some manual labour:
Will was super excited [...]

Triathlon clothing fashion doing the Full Circle?

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

My Miltos Manetas kit by LUMA circa 2009 XTERRA Worlds:

Check out LumaSports for your next custom made sports gear…

More Specialized Team camp

Thursday, January 14th, 2010

TV interview for www.i-am-specialized.com. Photo by Gary Perkin

Carla, Vicenza’s biggest triathlon fan

Tuesday, December 15th, 2009

Thanks to the wonders of the World Wide Web, triathlon has gone viral! Even in Vicenza, Italy…

When giving everything is not enough

Tuesday, November 3rd, 2009

2009 XTERRA World Champs podium by Rich Cruse
From L to R: Olivier Marceau (4th), Micheal Weiss (3rd), Eneko Llanos (1st), Nico Lebrun (2nd), Conrad Stoltz (5th)
Yes, I am disappointed. (Thanks for the nice e-mails. True friends are the ones who cares no matter the result) I did everything in my power to get to [...]

10 Questions with South African XTERRA athlete, Dan Hugo

Thursday, September 3rd, 2009

For starters, and the reader’s benefit, write a short paragraph about yourself:
I’m evading reality but painting a canvas with all the colour I can find. There’s a definite lack of technique, more just splashing lines and blobs of colour and allowing them to take on a story of their own. I was inspired, you see, [...]

10 Questions with Nikola Tosic

Tuesday, September 1st, 2009

For starters, and the reader’s benefit, write a short paragraph about yourself:
Born in 1977 in Belgrade. Grew up in Lagos, lived in Serbia, USA, Italia, South Africa and a bit in France. I love internet and work with online content for living. I enjoy doing sports and art (same stuff). I love good food. I [...]

The magic of Home stays

Monday, July 6th, 2009

People always wonder why pros prefer home stays at most races. Why not stay in a “nice hotel” and “rest up for the race?”
There are many reasons why home stay families are the best way of experiencing away from home racing: (in no particular order)
- When you travel as much as we do, you hate [...]

A clever story about a flat, Caveman teeth and ingenuity

Friday, June 12th, 2009

Dan Hugo and I  pre rode the XTERRA Richmond course shortly after our arrival from XTERRA Northwest Cup in Coeur D’Alene, where I had a 4 inch nail puncture my tubeless tire in 2 places. See previous blog.
My replacement tire was in the mail, so I rode the tire with the 2 nail holes, and [...]

XTERRA Coeur D’Alene

Monday, June 8th, 2009

XTERRA Midwest. Battle Creek, Michigan

Monday, May 18th, 2009

Winning smile & story time. During a week like this, so many things happen, its impossible to keep track of it all. I’ll try to give some perspective here.
My new race kit is officially here.  It arrived from Hong Kong on Friday. My mate Gary Mandy hooked me up sweet with LUMA kit. I have [...]

XTERRA Las Vegas 2009

Sunday, May 3rd, 2009

Viva Las Vegas!
Pic by Rich Cruse . Check out more race pics on Rich’s Twitter.
I had a good season opener, despite a few hic- ups on the bike. (a small crash and a twisted chain)
Josiah Middaugh from Colorado had a 1.15 lead after a phenomenal bike, but to my surprise I slowly reeled him in on [...]

Specialized tire testing camp in Stellenbosch

Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009

Burry Stander doing rolling resistance testing on the rollers. He rode at 25km/h and at 35km/h with about 20 different tires and measured the wattage needed to hold those speeds for each tire. On the right (reading the power  tap numbers) is Benno Willeit, our Specialized mechanic, and on the left is Tire Specialist Frank [...]

Nikola Tosic- The mad Serb behind the blogging

Monday, February 2nd, 2009

Here is a screen shot of Nikola Tosic, (on the right) “Cooling or dieing” and the Caveman blog he made. I posted the screen shot because I couldn’t figure out how to get the pic of him being cool (or dieing?). It turns out to be quite an interesting touch, I think. Sort of “a [...]

York Timbers Sabie Experience mountain bike race. 2008

Wednesday, December 17th, 2008

I just got back on the farm after riding 3 of the 4 days of Sabie Experience. Sabie is only 80km from our farm and when my good friend (and Specialized Factory team damager) Bobby Behan said we were invited to ride, we couldnt say no. Despite still being in the midst of “ice cream [...]

XTERRA USA Champs. Plumbed the deapths of empty legs, but won 6th XTERRA USA Series title

Monday, October 6th, 2008

photos by Rich Cruse photography

by Rich Cruse
What a weird, weird day.

XTERRA France 2008

Sunday, July 6th, 2008

Photo by Jacvan
What an experience. Very different from the usual XTERRA. Swam 3.5 laps (about 1.1km) in a small little lake at 1850m . (used to make snow in winter) There were 3 “Australiens” which in France, means getting out and running. Up a big embankment and down with a huge dive which took you [...]

Disaster at XTERRA Richmond 08

Monday, June 16th, 2008

photo by Nils Nilsen, see Xterra gallery for more
With 2 XTERRA USA Series victories so far, I was eager to beat the rush and wrap up the USA points series early. (best 3 out of 4 Series race to count towards Series. Plus compulsory Tahoe Nationals)

Blood, sweat, a flat tire, but another win at XTERRA Alabama 2008

Tuesday, June 10th, 2008

Howdy folks
Amber and I are on the road at the moment, traveling from Pelham (where we raced XTERRA Alabama yesterday) to Richmond. (XTERRA Virginia coming sunday) To break up the 12 hr drive, we decided to spend the night in a budget hotel to rest our aching legs and get some sleep. [...]