Posts Tagged ‘Conrad Stoltz’
After 3 long months of hard work demolishing my house (while packing away some hard training) I spent a week on my parents farm to say good bye to them and Africa before hitting the US for some serious racing.
Because internet in Africa is slow, expensive and hard to get, this story (and a few to come) are only seeing the interweb now. Also, if you only have a week in paradise with your folks, sitting on the computer is like a prison sentence…
Here are some of the highlights:
My dad would join me on my recovery rides, and let me tell you, I was on the ropes most of the time! Quite something for a 66 year old “ballie” who beat colon cancer 3 years ago. As you can see, he also rides for Specialized Factory Team as he is the one with the REAL genes in the family. My friends calls him “Tarzan”.
XTERRA switches to road triathlon
Classic XTERRA humour! Stay true my family- if we wanted easy we’d do Ironman…
The pic is me on that great Milwaukee course
Visit XTERRAPlanet for info and XTERRA.TV for action
“Meet that Bobby Behan dude”- slowtwitch.com interview
The time we put red dye in Bobby’s gloves…
The time we “lined them up like soldiers”…
Meet that Bobby Behan dude
Written by: Herbert Krabel
Date: Wed Mar 10 2010
[Many Pros really wanted to meet Bobby Behan the last few months when word got out that he was in charge of the new Specialized Triathlon team. But there was only so much space. Here is your chance to meet him.
Slowtwitch: Bobby, thank you very much for the chat.
Bobby: Herbert, thank you too. Always good touching base and I hope to see you at one of the upcoming events this year!
ST: Are you in Stellenbosch as we speak?
Bobby: I sure am. As I type I’m sitting on my stoop (SA terminology for porch), its evening time but still 30 Celsius (86F)!! Bliss!
ST: How often do you get tortured on rides, runs or swims by the Caveman Conrad Stoltz?
Bobby: Hmmm. The Caveman! I could write a book on him! Conrad has been a nocturnal creature lately so our training paths haven’t crossed!! He’s building his house during the day and training come nightfall! We did have a good coffee on Saturday morning! He hadn’t started training, yet I had finished a 2.5 hour ride. I suppose that’s one up for me! I did not make the MTB race on Sunday morning though, a race The Caveman won by over 11 minutes – that would have been torture!]
Good luck to Specialized riders Susi and Burry at Cape Epic
Pic by Gery Perkin
Good luck to fellow Specialized riders Christoph Sauser and Burry Stander on their quest to win the much heralded Cape Epic mountain bike stage race. 1500 riders from all over the globe tackles the 730kmin 8 days with 15 000m of climbing on sunday.
Read more about the Specialized team and their charity, Songo on Songo.info
Burry, now remember those down hill lessons I taught you at Team Camp 🙂
Yes, he is tiny. Or maybe someone supersized the Caveman and his wheels
“We expected Greg Bennett, but its the South African, Conrad Stoltz, who wins the only ITU leg in France” 1999
[“I’ll bet this is the strangest interview you’ve ever done,” says Conrad Stoltz as he locks his Specialized road bike to a lamp post outside a Stellenbosch coffee shop.
Thirty minutes earlier, he had to duck out from our conversation to visit his physiotherapist for a good working over: a couple of niggling injuries needed some soothing.
The “Caveman” has certainly been through his fair share of ups and downs over a career dating back to 1991. In fact, he may just be the longest serving professional sportsman in South Africa (if one thinks back to the 1995 Rugby World Cup, Conrad was already a “veteran” of the French triathlon circuit).
CRANK was fortunate enough to sit down with Conrad recently and talk about his early days as a professional triathlete in South Africa and continental Europe.
CRANK: Conrad, you had your “breakthrough” race aged 17 at the SA Champs in Langebaan way back in 1991. Could you talk us through your build up, expectations and the race itself?
CONRAD STOLTZ: That was indeed a “milestone” race for me – something just “happened” that day and I moved up the next level.
It was the first year that we had a heated pool in Pretoria – they built a Health and Raquet Club in Pretoria in 1990; I bought a life membership costing something like R700. So that was the first year that we were able to swim right through the winter, which had always hampered us in the years before.
My aspirations then were to win the junior category – there was great depth within the junior ranks with Greg Lunderstedt, Bryan Mellville, Cameron Jones, Dave Hyam; to name but a few.
On race day, there was a “more than” gale force southeaster which resulted in huge waves in the swim- very intimidating for us “Vaalies”. Back then we swam out the marina out to sea – or so it felt. – Kevin Richards had a huge lead out of the water, which he extended on the bike to over four minutes.
I was a complete “tri geek” and rode… ]
Click here for the rest of the classic interview on www.crank.co.za
France Iron Tour- the 10 stage one- in 95 or 96? Stage 2 start in Marseilles. That’s me in the middle, (silver sleeveless suit) hogging the start line. Back in the days I could still swim…
