Canyon Aeroad CFR: High Performance & Great Value | Oompa Loompa Cycling 178

Canyon Aeroad CFR Review with Matt: High Performance & Great Value

Join us in this podcast as Matt, a South African Olympian in rowing who started road cycling during COVID, shares his experience with the Canyon Aeroad CFR. Learn why this bike stands out among high-end models for its performance and value.

Key Topics:

• Aerodynamic Design: How the Aeroad CFR is built for speed.
• Premium Components: Matt’s thoughts on the SRAM Red eTap AXS.
• Lightweight Carbon Frame: Balancing strength and weight.
• Integrated Cockpit: Enhancing aerodynamics and comfort.
• Competitive Pricing: High-end performance at a lower cost.

Why It’s a Good Value:

• Advanced Technology: Latest features without the high price.
• Direct Sales Model: Canyon’s pricing advantage.
• Performance vs. Cost: Comparable performance for less money.

Matt’s Journey:

• Olympian Background: Transition from rowing to cycling during COVID.
• Local Race Wins: Achievements in local races since starting road cycling.
• Training Advice: Tips for aspiring racers and training enthusiasts.

Tune in as Matt shares his insights and experiences with the Aeroad CFR, offering valuable advice for those new to road cycling. Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for more!

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Book me for an interview and merch store: https://oompaloompacycling.com/
Get in touch: oompaloompacycling@outlook.com

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Chapters –
00:00 – Intro
03:00 – Differences in training methods between rower and cyclist
06:24 – What is your goal?
09:19 – Training schedule
13:46 – Race nutrition crucial for success
14:52 – Bike fit
16:26 – Focus on training instead of fancy bikes
17:52 – Canyon Aeroad
24:02 – The Olympian mindset
27:58 – Doping in cycling
30:57 – Singapore should learn from South Africa
32:07 – Letape Melaka review
37:57 – Canyon’s direct-to-consumer
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Music provided by NoCopyrightSounds.
Watch:

• if found x nøll – die 4 u (feat. damn…
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you know I think when I was um I think it’s easy in sport to get sucked into gimmicks and you know you have to stay away from gimmicks you have to identify those few things that really do make you fast from an equipment point of view and then really just focus on [Music] training fa away to the second third and fourth to the medal position one of these four is going to be disappointed Denmark only by oh not even the qu of the length of the boat Australia are coming hard at them Great Britain just being edged out Australia may sneak it h the death Australia are taking over here in Lane five it’s the green and gold who are going for gold Great Britain too coming up on the shoulder of the days it’s a sensational win South Africa came from nowhere welcome back to another episode guys I’m here with Matt uh Matt thank you for coming over to the podcast we first met at ocbc cycle I think Meador has uh one particularly very strong Rider know as met Britain so I think we we have to watch him very closely um he can he can go solo and he has a good finishing uh leg or so Matt Britain the legendary Matt Britain finally he’s been on the podium for every single race Matt good to find me see you again man absolutely fantastic race so um you know just super well organized a lot of fun and you don’t have in racing pair so here they take the average time of of the races and that just brings a whole new Tactical Dynamic to their event which is really cool and I’ve got your CV over here by the way thanks for sending it over to me um we’ve got a lot of questions from Instagram as well and we go through all about you cycling and Olympian um but those who are watching and who do not know Matt Matt is a 37y old um born and raised in South Africa and completed uh competed in South Africa for quite a number of years 2005 to 2012 in rowing so you an Olympian in rowing and you’ve been living in Singapore since 2018 and only started cycling in 2022 during covid a very impressive CV Matt U maybe if you could just tell us about yourself and of course the the history of you with u Olympic competitions and Rowing yes so I grew up in South Africa which is a very sporty country I think uh you know in rugby and also in Endurance Sports we have a very proud tradition a lot of good Sportsmen there and for me I really in in 1996 the Olympics was in Atlanta and that was a um that was I remember the plane taking all the athletes was painted in the South African flag and flew over the country and um and when it flew over my house I said no I want want to go to the Olympics and ever since then I was 8 years old at the time and I decided no I was going to make that my dream and I worked really really hard for 13 years to to make that a reality and uh yeah eventually I fell in love with the sport of rowing and um yeah one thing led to another and you know there I was at uh at it was a bumpy road but eventually got to to the start line in uh in London the London Olympics in 2012 and uh yeah very fortunate to to win that that race in um yeah 6 minutes of pure pain so it’s a bit different to cycling but actually a lot of the training was uh was quite similar um you know a lot of the a lot of the concepts that I use now are the same that I was training as a as a RAR and very effective uh training methods and yeah I mean uh after the Olympics I got injured and then I got a job and uh wasn’t really doing much sport and then in uh in during Co I was finding myself being a little bit too lethargic so decided no time to uh time to do something something else and get back into Sport and uh yeah discovered cycling and Road cycling and just totally fell in love with the sport and uh have been having so much fun and still yeah still seeming to get better especially on the tactics yeah but rowing is rowing something that’s very popular in South Africa or like how how did you you find out that okay I’m going to you know rowing is my talent why not running or you know cycling to even begin with yeah so I did try a lot of sports especially as a kid um and Rowing is is a unique Sports a little bit like cycling in that there’s so much technique and Physiology you know and then you need you need strength endurance and technique and actually en rowing a huge amount of Teamwork because you know you have to keep in sync with your your teammates so that combination was just really well suited to me H and uh and then you picked up cycling during co uh tell me a little bit about that like why cycling during Co why didn’t again did why didn’t you pick up something else like why why cycling in particular um so I had done a little bit of cycling in the past and I had a bike and I thought okay well a good race to to enter would be this uh stage race in South Africa and that would get me back into shape kick me kick me back into action So I entered that race and then uh started training for it and uh yeah when I got back from that I decided no I’m going to enter the Lup and yeah just one thing led to another and uh yeah here I am training uh five six times a week trying to do 15 hours a week which is uh which is quite a lot for someone with a job and you you do B with mountain biking as well right did you start it off with mountain biking yeah so you know um I wouldn’t say the roads in Singapore are safe but they are safer than the roads in South Africa so that was my if I wanted to do any riding in South Africa I always did it uh on the mountain bike which is beautiful writing over there I mean amazing trails and just such incredible scenery and then in Singapore I kind of decided no well I got roped into it by my team that I needed to do some some road racing and uh yeah I didn’t realize how cool that would be Chris room is from South Africa I think right yeah he went to school uh just down the road from where I grew up are you guys like Facebook friends or something no no no okay and uh I know in in most people who are watching probably they know that you’ve been winning a lot of races here in Singapore for um do you think that the competition here is just too easy for you no I I mean of course not I think uh I think I’m a very you know I’ve got a huge pedigree as a as an endurance athlete and I think that helps a lot and now that I’m training hard uh you know I think um I think it’s not unusual for someone like me to be at the top end I think there’s a lot of youngsters now that are coming up um and I think that they will if they keep training properly they will definitely be much faster than me in a in a year or two what’s the the the goal for you like what what are you trying to achieve all this uh my main goal is to be healthy so I really want to just live a healthy lifestyle so I’m always reminding myself like not to be too aggressive in the traffic and just be calm because very competitive person and uh everything’s a race in the in the traffic and um but yeah my main goal is to be healthy and uh and I mean I just love the racing I just totally I just yeah I really really enjoy pushing myself and like that uh yeah the comp competition in the race is just amazing do you think because you’re an Olympian you you had that physique of uh of an athlete that you know cycling is is kind of is it relatively easier or it gives you that cutting age uh I don’t think it’s because of I me I don’t think I have a natural physique but I think because I trained so hard for so long as a Olympic athlete um you know obviously that’s a huge Advantage when I started doing cycling I mean my cardio system and all that has the benefit of many years of ultra Hardcore training so so so training so just now off camera we were talking about um it’s just not about training right you say it’s also the mentality of of winning uh races it’s just not about just putting in the hours it’s that Tipping Point is in it yeah so I mean I think so for my whole journey as a as a kind of Elite Sportsman I was always never satisfied with how I was doing I was always pushing myself harder and never happy with a session or a race I could win the race but I still come off and say oh this could have been better and that and that’s just a loser mentality you know and I I think I realized no you actually have to enjoy the moment you have to celebrate those small wins and that helps you to become a winner and uh so that’s a huge part of it right you have to structure everything that you do to have a winning mindset so for example when I do my interval sessions now I never want to feel like I’m hanging on for dear life in those last few uh I always I always start a little bit easier and then do them incrementally harder not because of the physiology but because you put yourself in a very strong mental place when you are doing it each piece is a little faster than the previous one and that’s how you change your neural Pathways to being uh a winner so uh aside from training so let’s Pi me for example I’m just a weekend Rider how do I be a m Britain like how do I how do I change that mindset and how do I get there yeah I think you’ve got to start with what your goals are and you have to be realistic about how much effort it’s going to take to to get there so if you want to win the Singapore national champs then you’re going to have to train you know 20 hours a week and it’s going to have to be 20 very high quality hours um so for me you have to do a mix of like base training like uh longer rides at an easier Tempo and then you know make sure you’re doing plenty of these like V2 Max sessions like 5 minutes as hard as you can and you do that like four times maybe so how’s your your your training schedule like uh give me a picture of like a week I know you’ve got a job and everything how does it look like for you yeah so I try and do 15 hours or 500ks per week and okay yeah I’m not so good at it but I really try to do a minimum of 400 kilm and then and then 500 is kind of my my goal and um I’m I spread that out so I want most of this writing to 80% of it to be what I call zone two so zone two is kind of that edge where you can’t really where you can still have a conversation with someone but you can’t just chat so I don’t want it to be too easy I see a lot of people here ride at a very low intensity they do like a lot of hours but their speed is very slow and they’re just chatting and they they’re not really pushing themselves so even my like I never do like recovery rides or coffee rides or any of that I just always do it at a at a reasonably hard intensity like the top end of my kind of uh base Zone and that’s like 80% of my of my training then um the other 20 I try and do these like uh the really hard so I want to do like uh 4×4 minute pieces um where I’m doing them like right at what I can do like tomorrow I’ve got uh 5 time 6 minutes and I’ll do I’ll do them like above my FTP so most people know what the FTP is I’ll be doing those above my FTP and the last one I really crank it as hard as I can and then always do throw in a few Sprints in the week as well how how did you get to know all of this this structured training and all all this is this something that you researched on your own or you had that you had a trainer well for rowing I had uh you know the benefit of a fantastic physiologist who was setting the program and a coach and you know some of the best uh Sports scientists in the world that were working on our team so they structured a similar kind of program and then since I started cycling I just been reading a lot about it and trying to remember how we used to train and I’ve chatted to all coaches so how are you liking cycling so far this sound like a very stupid question but no I’m super I like I’m in love with the sport I think it’s amazing um it’s got so many elements you know you’ve got that social element where you can chat to your friends it’s super hard physically and um yeah I mean and the racing is just there’s just so much in it from a tactical point of view you know when do you how do you identify those critical moments and you know take advantage of your of your opponent’s tactics and it’s just so much going on how do they try and disrupt your plans how you going to react so yeah it’s just the mentally it’s like a real game of chess out there yeah and you right for Meador the racing team here in Singapore I’m not sure if you can reveal the strategy like what’s what so how is it like so take for example the tap I know you came in second um how are you guys communicating with one another are you guys do you guys prepare for the race or do you just clean up for the race and then we just goore by field yeah I think some of the other teams um maybe have a more structured uh race plan but for us you know I think we we try and um everyone in the team has to to contribute at least once during the race to just something and so if if you’re a weaker Rider then maybe you’re just like doing one you’re just chasing back one break away or you’re just causing some chaos in the beginning by attacking or doing something like that and uh and if you’re a stronger Rider then you know we’re just all try and participate in the race we don’t want to just uh sit in the in the pelaton um but yeah of course every now and then we we say okay we’re going to attack at this point and we try and get like three or four of us together and and we’ll do that or um yeah but you know the racing at this level is not um it’s not like the Tour of France where you have like nine of your teammates and they just go on the front and just burn themselves out you know you we all here to race for ourselves and uh you know try and get the balance right and and is nutrition something that you’re very cautious about are you very cautious like what do I eat today High car y y and on the bike so in a race nutrition is absolutely critical if you get your nutrition wrong like no amount of training is going to save you like that is you just have to get it right and you have to eat a lot you know a huge amount of carbs um minimum of 60 gram of carbs per hour I would say is what you have to be eating or out there in the race for training and for life I mean I I’m not uh I’m not a good role model from that so what do you bring on on the bike when you’re racing like what are you eating and what are you drinking yes I take uh you know we um we we use the uh Tailwind nutrition so that’s um they’ve got a great powder that we I put in my water bottles and they got some of these ammo gels and I I just smash that and I just try and get the mix right a couple of bananas and cramp fix as well cuz uh you know I I swear quite a bit especially here in the tropics so yeah you got to you got to make sure you’re keeping that salt right yeah uh the interesting story of how I knew you I mean I knew your name I’ve heard of your name here in Singapore um but it’s because of of Gary so Gary did the bike fit for you and he was telling you a very funny story he said yeah Matt came into the the fit and his bike setup was all haywired his seat post was so low he didn’t have a proper bike fit and I I was I was joking I like what how how how is that possible he’s still winning a lot of races and uh and at at one point I think he said that the seat post was even stuck and they you you guys had to yank it out of the the bike yeah I mean you know I think when I was um I think it’s easy and Sport to get sucked into gimmicks and you know you have to stay away from gimmicks you have to identify those few things that really do make you fast from an equipment point of view and then really just focus on training you know you have to train hard and uh and train volume and that that’s way more important than having just little funny extra things right so to my detriment I think I ignore some very important things like for example the bike fit yeah um and when I got the bike fit then I felt a lot better afterwards so I was very glad when I did eventually get that but I mean even when I change between my my Different Bikes uh then um they’re like a bit different and stuff and I think that’s also a useful skill right I don’t want to have just everything exactly the same and then one thing slightly out you become unadaptable if everything’s always perfect right so you know I do my mountain biking I do so you build up different muscles and um yeah but then this one now is uh is is set up right so so my my channel we’ have got a lot of fancy bikes here and you were just saying that you know focus on training material I mean the the the equipment is not that important right um what was your first road bike that you got my first road bike was a Swift and I still got it here in Singapore and I got it from one of my teammates um so I was just training for mountain biking and then rode with some Matador guys at the mountain bike and they said Oh Come and join us for this 300K ride called the odax so I thought ha great excuse I don’t have a road bike and they said no problem I was oh damn should have come up with a better reason and they lent me this Swift and eventually I bought it from uh from my teammate male and I love that bike but yeah that’s my first road bike okay and then you is this the second one and this is my second one yeah how long have you owned this bike one year okay and why a canyon specifically um well both bought the canyon cuz it’s very good value for money and I also like the way Matthew vandero races and I mainly bought it because I like the paint job oh yeah tell tell us about the paint job this one yeah so actually this is the same so the ladies team um is uh called Canyon Shram and they had this as their bike for from last year and there was a period of time where you could buy it buy the same bike that they had and I just think it looks cool so yeah and you just bought it on online from the canyon website yeah yeah okay and could you just run us through the the setup that you have over here I think a lot of bik geeks on my channel would like to know yeah so I was um so it’s a it’s a canyon Air Road and you know in Asia where I’m riding here in Singapore and uh you know Malaysia it’s pretty flat so you want an arrow setup I think that is very very key um you know I’m not doing climbing races and I actually noticed that even in the to like to France the most of them are racing riding this Air Road they’re not riding the the climbing version of the canyon they’re riding the aerodynamic version so clearly this is like even though it’s a little bit heavier it’s like seven and a bit kilos and then um it’s got the Shram red uh group set which is I was a bit nervous to get the Shram cuz everyone was saying oh no Shimano Shimano but I love the Shram to me it’s much better as an amateur cuz you can take the battery out and you know you’ve got this app that you can see what’s going on and which one is working and if something is wrong with one shifter you can actually recode it with your phone so that you can just use the left hand shifter to do the the job um just to get you home obviously you can’t race like that but um so I just find it a bit more I don’t have a mechanic looking at my bike every single day so sometimes I need to be able to like sort stuff out myself on the road so I ride with a spare battery if something goes wrong with the battery I can just replace it y so yeah very happy with that and then um obviously the big part big custom job that I have done on my bike is uh uh I’ve got the wheel Angel Arrow wheels on this and uh yeah I met Andy who who’s the wheel Angel guy um after I destroyed a set of rooms on my previous bag riding I melted the carbon down a downhill in the wet and was it a rib bre yeah oh wow it was terrifying I tell you that was scary but um yes I met him after that and then yeah I’ve been so now all my bikes have uh his awesome wheels on them so these are 60 mil deep and I think you could actually even go deeper like you know it it was the one thing that I put on the bike where I felt it was way faster so I had these very shallow light climbing wheels and I would do tmcr at a certain speed and then the day I got these wheels it was uh it was massively faster when I got the Deep section Wheels which is interesting because uh you know when I got the canyon bike I was thinking it’s going to be so much faster than the Swift bike and it felt the same right so I mean I think it is a little bit faster when I do my tests but it’s not much but when I got the wheels it was like way faster uh to get those deep section Wheels yeah I always tell people like the biggest upgrade is the wheels just get deep Wheels if you’re going flat out you will feel the difference I agree I and um because you know here we sweat as well like quite a lot I got these super hardcore um hubs which are the Chris King hubs so I think they apparently they are bulletproof and I’ve I can test that they’ve I’ve done some pretty hard miles on them yeah and um the rest the rest of the items are pretty stock right there’s nothing much that you you’ve made yeah it’s uh it’s the standard seat and um Arrow cockpit which is very nice I have the handlebars set as narrow as they can go M so it’s quite a cool feature that they can adjust but I just have them narrow narrow yeah and I’d I’d be happy to have them even narrower if they if they could how narrow would you want them to go I don’t know like time trial narrow do you have a time trial bike I don’t have a TT bike but uh I’ve put TT bars on this and it’s it’s a pretty good it’s a good setup okay and um uh TI you’re running the Victoria CA Pros yeah so um those are the most common ties I I think in the prop pelaton and I’m very happy with them they’re super they don’t last that long they like proper race tires um on my training bike I have some bulletproof also Victorious but um not not the race ones okay uh what would your dream bik be uh if money was not an issue I think this one is pretty close to my dream bike I’m really really happy with that yeah I also like the um the kago okay but um I try to I think it just I like the interesting bik right I think I just want something that looks a cool right it looks like a fantastic bike uh by the way your wife Alicia as well I think she’s uh very accomplished cyclist as well yeah and she really I mean like I she’s become a fantastic cyclist over the last couple of years and she really doesn’t uh she doesn’t come from um like the same sporting history that I had so yeah pretty interesting that she just proves my training program is a is a good one you got to train hard maybe you got to sell some of your training programs here yeah I mean I I I won’t sell it but anyone can ask me and I’ll send it to them okay cool um we’ve got a couple of questions on Instagram maybe you’ll just take a a 5 minute break okay yeah transform your cycling experience with the psych plus es2 pro and as2 pro Max E pumps today say goodbye to manual pumping the py plus as2 pro and as2 pro Max is an ultra portable with aluminum alloy body It inflates 2 25c tires from 0 to 80 PS side on a single charge and fits both Presta and Shadow valve effortlessly featuring a digital build gauge you get a precise pressure readings every time the as2 pro Max offers even faster inflation and enhanced performance making it the reliable choice for serious cyclists join cyclist worldwide who trust py plus and enjoy worldwide shipping straight to your door plus use my promo code olc for an exclusive 10% discount the side class S2 pro and as2 pro Max are the cheapest on the market with this offer don’t miss out and upgrade your ride with Psy plus today visit py plus.com now and use my promo code olc for your discount Okay so we’ve got some Instagram q&as that you guys have submitted for Matt uh Matt are you ready you’ve not seen any of these questions um the first question is uh you’re spoiling the Singapore Market no one can beat an Olympic gold medalist here uh I think uh for sure the athletes here can uh can beat me I think there’s a firstly there’s a young a youngster in the Matador team his name is Will Mitchell who’s a really up and cominging uh Beast I think he’s going to be beating me pretty soon and uh and also a lot of Juniors especially at the at the Mavericks and our fan in in matadors also very very talented so I think anyone who trains really hard um at a you know when I was run at the Olympics I trained like 30 to 35 hours a week wow and you know if you think about how much that is on a day it’s like it’s like 5 hours a day and and we trained three times one day twice the next day three times twice three times twice and we only got one day off every fifth week so you can just imagine like how much training I’ve got inside me and I think that’s what these youngsters need to do as well right they need to if they want to beat me um well firstly I think they really ready as close or or right there right it’s like um but that’s what they have to do right they have to train like that big volume and and train hard like not it’s not just about coffee rides don’t be lazy and yeah it’s like quality miles right where you’re really pushing yourself uh I interviewed this um Malaysian Olympian his name is Josiah he’s he was a Malaysian uh track Olympian and he says uh if I if I’m quoting him correctly or referencing him correctly he said that because of the mindset uh that the Olympian goes through it’s so rigorous that it kind of messes up with the mentality do you think that’s the case in a bad way or a good way look it’s very stressful to go to the Olympics you know you know it’s your one chance to perform and to live that dream and you can easily make it like too big and so I always try to you know I think I got a lot of that mental strength comes from actually just making it less than it is right so I try and always play down just the same as I if I go to a race I’m like same as training and I actually learned this when I was young my first world Champs I thought ah World Champs I’m going to be all excited for it and I’m going to want it more and I’m going to be faster because it’s a world Champs I’ll be 10 seconds faster and guess what I got exactly the same time at my world champs as I had back in training and I learned a important lesson like if you want to be fast at the world Champs you got to be fast every day you know you it’s not about if you can get a few extra on peaking it’s a bonus but the way you wake up on the day of your big race is the same that you’re going to wake up you have to wake up that way every day cuz you can’t wake up a different person right you have to slowly improve yourself to be how you want to be on the big day and um yeah so I think that mentality uh you so I I try and play down the big events and just focus on making sure my daily training and routine is at a high standard so right now do you take any bricks at all breaks at all are you always like cycling cycling cycling every day no I mean I’m I’m uh not the most disciplined athlete like I have these great weeks where I don’t have that much where my work is manageable and I can really just do huge volume of training I get my 500ks but I mean plenty of times it’s uh I just you I’m I’m lazy or hung over or yeah I mean I’m not uh I Rely a lot on my my Heritage as a of History training of training more than my current like disciplin routine all right um the next question is um why do you think doping is so H is a big stigma in cycling while it’s pretty much tolerated amongst people who goes to the gym for example um well look I think as uh you know if you’re going into the gym and you want to do it for looking good and stuff then that’s on you right you’re not stealing something from from other people so I feel that it’s a zero tolerance in fact I think the punishment should be way harsher like why not lifetime ban for anyone and why not I mean people should have a jail sentence for it cuz it’s it’s a theft right yeah um now why do I think cycling has more doping than other sports I think well obviously um there’s like the financial incentive and the like effect that the the drugs have on on on you but I think the real problem is that cycling is a sport where you’re rewarded for being devious right if you’re a junior and you want to get onto that team how do you win a race in cycling you have to get to the Finish Line with fresher legs than the guy next to you and one way is to train harder but the other way is to just be in his draft to to just do that little bit less so that when you get to the Finish Line you’re stronger and so if you’re like a junior or you know how do you you might be winning races and getting recognized and getting put into the pro team not because you’re better than the guy who came second but because you’re just that bit more devious and so I think you’re kind of building this kind of culture of like kind of nasty people really in uh in that Pro pelaton and um yeah and I think I think that’s where it is like at its core where a lot of other sports are not like that right they’re like more collaborative and more team and stuff yeah do you think like the world tour guys are probably doping right now that they’re just not getting caught right I mean it was like I never I used to watch the Twitter France and I used to love Lance Armstrong and when he got caught for for drugs it was like it was a terrible thing for me because I always idolized him and yeah I mean uh what I do you know like even in this uh this race I think Pacha didn’t beat panton’s time up one of the big climbs despite the huge improvements in nutrition the huge improvements in bike technology the huge improvements in training and professionalizing of training um so you’d think well it’s obviously it must be less drugs than there was but I have to I mean I I I can’t comment on it right I know nothing but um yeah okay they are impressive athletes as well right they train so hard and um I mean it’s I think it’s easy to say oh they they that good because maybe they don’t being bad I mean I don’t think so I think it’s also that they just train like animals and they just just really strong yeah okay the next question is uh from our guy behind the camera he says um he’s asking how would you encourage someone to start racing yeah so I mean this is something I feel like South Africa Singapore could learn from South Africa here I mean South Africa just regular races like everyone shows up they don’t really care where they come they just they just arrive at the race and just do it and they just participate and so just a normal race on a Saturday we’ll have like a th000 people like 2,000 people will just show up all of the biggest Mass participation races in the world are in South Africa most of them so like we’re like 40,000 cyclists will come out um and so I think Singapore just needs to people just need to just go to the start line doesn’t matter if you you know how badly you do you just have to go there and and you have to dip your toe in do you think there just a lack of races here in Singapore the fact that Singapore is just too small yeah I think it’s a chicken and egg right there’ll be more races if there was more uh more people participating in the race and it made it more lucrative for a sponsor to come on board or for the organizer to kind of put the race together yeah um you know the Mala I’m not sure if you know Roman he he writes with meth as well um and he said that he couldn’t join the Thea and I’m and and I I haven’t joined a a race in a very long time and I’m like okay I’ll take your B I’ll I’ll go down to Malica and I went and uh I didn’t know uh what the cost was like what’s the distance and he signed up for the elite race and I’m like crap I don’t think I can join the elite race uh looking at my physic and my my training plan uh but you know heck it I said I’m just going to go if I get dropped I’ll just wait for the non-competitive wave to come and sweep me um but after the race I I think I managed my my objective was to finish the race without getting dropped and hold on to The Paton and I really enjoyed the race at the end of it and after that I signed up for so many races in in in Malaysia exactly man and see that’s it right you got to just you got to just dive in and just uh you know not have too big of fear of failure yeah I think I think it’s the fear of failure that most people have and and myself included when I went for the tap right I’m just like oh what if I get Dro am I going to finish I’ll look like an embarrassment you know um so I think it’s that always that fear yeah it’s so I mean and also you don’t have to join the 140k race right this 60k race which is really cool and um yeah and I mean with a little bit of training anyone can do that L up and and really enjoy it and that’s a great race really really really a great race and and the L I just want to come back to that uh I saw the finishing you were just just a couple of seconds behind the Malaysian guy who came in who crossed the Finish Line first what would happen oh that was a very upsetting uh race I mean um so I was really super strong there that that race for I I just had like amazing legs from a few weeks before we had been racing and just was crushing it in that race but this guy I couldn’t shake him and he just he didn’t really do that much on the front and then uh especially like the last like 30ks was just me like pulling the whole time on the front and I I should have tried harder to to shake him off um but I couldn’t get rid of him and ah man and then he and then I thought okay well he’s obviously very tired and he won’t be able to like sorry cuz each time I we I tried to I could just feel like is just about ready to snap it so I thought okay well if it comes down to a Sprint like I’ll just do that and then at least he won’t be able to beat me in the Sprint but um that’s a kind of cocky thought thinking that gets you punished but but you said you were you were pulling most of the time in the front so what was strategy to do a breakaway and or why did you just sit behind his wheel so I was in the pelaton and there was quite a big Breakaway ahead and then I broke away from the pelaton and bridged to the the the Breakaway and he came with me for that but there were a few other people as well at that stage and no one really wanted to kind of work that much so I had to keep attacking and and I carried on attacking even when we caught the Breakaway just to kind of thin the group out but he was the one guy who just W didn’t get dropped right and then um then once we got on our own I thought okay well we’ve got like 40ks to go we better we better really hammer it now to get the Gap and he did do a couple of turns there but yeah just like not really that much and then I was still thinking about getting caught and and I should have just I should have just rested and said well you know what there’s no we either work together and we go together or we both get caught and then that’s it because you have to you have to risk losing to win a race and I wasn’t there and so I lost because I um I was too precious about it right was he a Lone Ranger or he had a team he didn’t have a team not that I was aware of yeah I think he’s a pretty I think he’s an expr or something I found out later but uh yeah he was a good Rider I mean he was good so SM you know when I was in the the race as well so I was in the the I think third or fourth Paton in in that that Elite race and I was I was coming quite close to the front and I see a bunch of guys uh pulling The Paton but I I wanted to help out but I’m like if I help out now I’m probably going to drain my legs I might as well just continue drafting at the end of the day for me I’m not trying to be number one right so I I just kept drafting everyone all the way to the end and I just kind of you know finished it I didn’t bother one thing to um pull the peton yeah I mean you have to decide how much work you’re going to do and um how how smart it is to do that work you don’t want to just drag everyone else yeah but you also don’t to get to the Finish Line with fresh legs that’s just annoying oh this is an interesting one um why is Pro Racing so oh I don’t know if I can ask this question so white male dominated why aren’t there any Asian racing yeah I mean it’s a good question if you go and race in Thailand you’ll see all these amazing youngsters there that are just absolutely flying up the hills but I think um look all sports are dominated by the areas where they have a proud Heritage right so if you grow up in Belgium Belgium is a country with like a handful of people and yet it’s super dominant in the sport of cycling if you go and look at any records like most wins across all cycling disciplines Belgium stands amongst the best of best in the world even though it’s a tiny country right and it’s because kids grow up there doing cycling they believe it’s like their blood it’s like South Africa is good at rugby because when you’re a kid you play rugby if you are in Kenya you’ll be a good runner right so why is it that Europeans are good at cycling I think it’s just because there’s more of it there they’re more exposed but yeah I’m definitely not a believer in um and I mean my example of rowing in South Africa it’s like one of the driest countries in the world and we did well so it’s just about what you do with your talent not I don’t think it’s really uh an endowment problem okay uh the last question before we wrap this up um about your bike uh do you think is part uh getting parts availability a deterring factor for you getting another Canyon in the future because they do direct consumer um no I I don’t think so I think the I really like the canyon um getting the parts there’s a there’s a uh it’s it’s all been fine so far okay cool um Matt thank you so much um thanks for sharing your insights is there anything else you would like to um mention on on the podcast before I I wrap this up no I think uh it’s been really fun and um yeah I I’m very approachable if anyone wants to chat to me they’re welcome to uh to reach out and uh yeah be happy to go for a ride or uh answer any questions share my program whatever it is yeah thank you man and uh that’s it thank you so much cool Love by so you still in my head me blood shot eyes can’t sleep I’m rotting in my bed even the DRS don’t me I don’t think you understand I gave you everything I had when it go wrong and now you got me wondering why why you let me die alone [Applause] inside I died for you I cried for you I tried for you tell me why you left me bleeding I died for you I cried for you I cried for you tell me why you left me bleeding [Music] i di for you