Skids & Giggles Mountain Bike Podcast

We sat down with Colin and Antoine Massart from Massart Biketrails as well as our former guest and fan favourite Greg Jolliffe.

Earlier in 2024, the boys were building the “Dreamline” for a Kriss Kyle edit in Glassie Bike Park and that video got released later in the summer to much fanfare. The trail itself is part of the bike park now and open to the public for everyone to enjoy!

In our chat, we get to hear some more insights into the build of the line, about working with Kriss and the many challenges of digging trail in the Scottish countryside. But the conversation turns into much more than that as we dive into the “heart in the art” of trail building, the inspiration and influences coming from the community, competing builders, multi-faceted athletes like Kriss, different disciplines or other sports altogether, progression in the sport and what it means to actually put these very diverse “dreams” of what a trail should be into the dirt.

Mentions

All of our "trail building" episodes

Greg Jolliffe: Instagram, Jolliffe Builds, Ep17

Massart Biketrails: Instagram, Website, Colin, Antoine

Dreamline videos: Edit, Build series Ep1, Ep2, Ep3 and Ep4

Kriss Kyle: Instagram, Youtube

Glassie Bike Park: Instagram, Trailforks, Ray Will

We sat down with Bram from Essar Cycles to get to know the story and the brain behind his steel creations.

Unlike some of our other guests, Bram’s journey starts with the conviction that yes, of course, he can make his own bikes. It’s just a matter of finding out how and the number of different side projects along the way.

Over the years, Bram has created some eye-catching frames and we get to hear all about his approach and philosophy to making bikes, his experiments, successful and otherwise, dual flex pivots and a missed opportunity for a patent, and of course, what the future holds for Essar Cycles and getting more people riding his creations.

Mentions

Essar Cycles: Instagram, Email

Reto Aebischer: Ep82, Ep48

Stefan Lorenz of Scar Cycles: Ep50

Bryson's hardtail

Chris Porter interview on Pinkbike

Egerie

Pascal sat down with Stefano Nucera for a podcast experiment of sorts, co-hosting each other’s podcasts for a chat about bikes, our stories in the sport so far, cycling communities, gravel, enduro, fixie crit and alleycat racing in Berlin, beers in the broom wagon, losing one’s bike packing virginity and, of course, Stefano’s non-alcoholic beer brand, Zeer.

Stefano is the host of the Broomwagon Podcast and naturally, when two podcasters sit down for a chat, conversation flows at warp speed. We did indeed cover a lot of ground and that’s not even all that we talked about. That being said, this was certainly not the last time I sat down with Stefano, for a podcast, a Zeer or otherwise.

Mentions

Trans Madeira Debrief

Stefano Nucera: Website, Instagram

The Broomwagon Podcast: Website, Instagram, Spotify

Zeer Brewing: Website, Instagram

Pascal's bike packing route: Day 1, Day 2 and Day 3

We sat down with Reto Aebischer for a journey deep into the Afterlife.

However, in this instance, the afterlife is not a promised existence in your favourite spiritual realm. The “Afterlife” is the name of Reto’s home-made carbon enduro bike that he also rode at the recent Best Ride Of The Year in Thun!

We get the all-access, behind the scenes look of what it’s like to make your own carbon bike at home, the many frustrations and challenges along the way, key design decisions, insights in to future improvements and, of course, the feelings of riding a bike you made yourself for that very first time!

It’s the been almost two years since we first sat down with Reto to talk about his carbon workshop projects and it was fun catching up on the process of actually finishing the enduro bike he just started when we first talked.

For this one, we sit down exactly how we imagined it in the early days of the podcast: Just two good buddies having a chat, talking about bikes and things that could be. After almost 4 years and over 80 episodes, we could finally make it happen!

In our chat, we relive the Best Ride Of The Year in Thun with all the ups and downs and the many impressions of the day. But more importantly, we reflect on our process, the learnings from the event and the improvements we can make towards an even better ride of the year in 2025!

As we mention in the recording, Darren Mace, the Trail Tracker, has just released a set of videos from the day on his Youtube channel. Make sure to check those out to get some impressions of the day!

Skids & Giggles Best Ride of the Year 2024 (Thun) - Part 1

Unreal trails near Thun with the Skids & Giggles Podcast crew - Part 2

Many thanks also to Yannik Wälti and Roger Schütz for their help in putting the day together and to Josh Curtis for the coffee!

Skids & Giggles Alumni on the ride:

Luise Rohland: Zürtrails Antenne #5, Ep41, Ep23

Felix Lüttin of 612 Parts: Ep49, Ep74

Stefan Lorenz of Scar Cycles

Reto Aebischer

Darren Mace, Trail Tracker Switzerland: Ep 33, Ep 64

Esteban “Yeti” Zimmermann