What a year! Alan Hatherly is cross-country World Champion, World Cup Series winner and Olympic bronze medallist, Candice Lill made the overall podium of the World Cup Series and Matt Beers won his 3rd Absa Cape Epic – among a host of other proudly South African achievements in 2024.
The amount of sold-out races and packed trails all over the country, plus Saffas at big global events and bike parks, tells us that mountain biking is cranking. Bike tech continues to evolve and every discipline, from marathon stage racing to enduro and now gravel racing, has us upgrading with cool new equipment to enhance our favourite pastime.
Mountain Bike mag celebrates this passion. We deliver 140+ page, large-format, coffee-table keepsake mags seasonally and the Summer edition is another peach, ready to inspire you over the holidays that lie ahead.
For those who live to ride new trails, we travel southern Africa and the globe to show you the best of what’s waiting for you out there. Local riders like you share their stories of bucket-list experiences, including advice on what to or not do so that you can confidently wander the world by bike. We explored and took awesome images from the top of the Zambezi River gorge on a wilderness ride near Vic Falls in Zimbabwe, through the night from the berg to the beach on sani2c trails, under colourful prayer flags on steep Himalayan slopes in Bhutan, across the hot desert sands of Morocco, over Anglo-Boer battle sites in the KZN Midlands, and into Viking land in Norway – to name just a few of our delicious travel features to enjoy. By South Africans for South Africans 🇿🇦
Apart from inspiring you, we also try to help you ride more efficiently – so you can go further and faster with less stress. We loved spending time with a guy who gives us real belief that massive gains are easily within reach. Our proudly South African coach to many of the greats of MTB, Barry Austin, provides deep scientifically based insights into why we may be training and racing the wrong way. More and more miles of pain is no longer the smart way to get faster on the bike. Check out his fascinating feature on page 86 that will get you thinking.
If all this stoke-inspired reading has you amped to try a few races, we have you covered with our Summer race calendar on page 142, with events in everyone’s backyard. The easiest way to motivate yourself is to sign up and start counting sleeps. Okay, that and maybe buying some new kit or even a new bike. We test out and present a bunch of cool stuff for you to kickstart your gift wishlist.
That’s just the tip of the iceberg – we have loads more cool people, training, gear and travel content to enjoy plus our last word on page 146 that might leave you pondering the concept of performance enhancement. Grab a copy at your local Woolies, Exclusive Books, Spar or better bike shops – you can find the stockist list here link
If you're too amped to wait and like your favourite reading on your computer, ipad or phone. you can download the digital version right now at https://joom.ag/3ZSd
Think about spoiling a friend or anyone you think needs a bit of motivation – this makes the best gift because it keeps on giving.
