Pascal sat down with Samuel Sommerhalder for a chat about our takeaways from the Swiss Cycling Guide courses, his Freeride Bike Academy in Andermatt and Aarau, his life as an online marketing specialist with the Digital Creators and how all those puzzle pieces come together in his everyday activities on and off the bike. Sämi made the trip to HQ for a rare in-person recording and it was fun to catch up and relive some of the good times, but also to get some "trail intel" on his chosen home in Andermatt and to hear more about his goals with the Freeride Bike Academy as well as the Freeride Bike ..read more

We sat down with Marco Giarrana for a deep dive into his company, FAIR Bicycle. With FAIR, Marco and his business partner Valentin are trying to rewrite the script of what product design and manufacturing means and it was interesting to hear Marco’s thoughts on sustainability, transparency, cradle to cradle design, innovation, working with suppliers and how all those puzzle pieces come together in FAIR Bicycle. With the Drop Best dropper clamp for mountain bikes and the Daily Hook cargo strap for cargo bikes, FAIR has two products out in the wild to illustrate what their approach actually mean ..read more

We sat down for a chat with Michelle Neuner after Chris Räber dropped her name into the hat as one to watch the other day and to hear her story with the bikes so far. And oh boy, what a story it is! Michelle left us impressed with her energy and passion for riding and we're sure to see a lot more from her in the coming years! With the run-up to the Paris Olympic games ahead of us, there are interesting possibilities to ponder and we do get to hear her take on competition, progression, freeride and her own goals in the sport. Michelle has also recently been invited to be the first female rider ..read more

We hosted Felix Lüttin of 612 Parts for an in-person demo of the recently introduced 612 "Die Pedale", his cyber truck brakes and more of his creations, followed by our very first live recording and Q&A at Biroma in Zurich! Felix is a repeat guest on the podcast and made waves with his brakes over the last two years, appearing on a number of show bikes and even scoring a review with the Enduro magazine. It was great having Felix on hand to present his designs and talk about the pedals with our guests at the shop. And we just had a blast meeting so many of our friends and listeners! You can ..read more

We got to catch up with "Swiss" Chris Räber about old dogs and new tricks! If you have been following his socials like us, you will also have noted a surprising increase in clips posted to his Instagram and one thing is certain: those whips don’t lie! Chris completed 30 days of whips at the back end of last year in a mission to bring back the skills – and stoke! – of mastering tricks, and to reignite his passion for riding his bike every day! We dive deep into the experience and into the principles that apply to everyone struggling to learn new skills or to bring back long forgotten ones. Cons ..read more

We sat down with the Trailforks Ambassador for Switzerland, Andre Trummer, or, as he is known on the platform and on Pinkbike: Jurasick. Crowdsourcing and communities stand at the core of Trailforks and Andre gives us a great overview of the main features, on how the approach works on the platform, what his role is in channeling all that data and what regular users can do to improve the platform, apart from just uploading their GPS files. Of course, we also get to hear about Andre’s favourite features, how he got into Trailforks himself and about how he works with institutions like Schwei ..read more

Happy new year and welcome to a special episode of the Skids & Giggles Podcast! Our main resolution for 2024 is to connect with our community in new ways and to try and build a bridge between the virtual of the podcast and the real life experience of meeting up, hanging out and playing bikes with our friends, guests and listeners. In this episode, we lay out the basics of our idea, share some of our takes on what makes a great day on the bike and how YOU can help us bring to life YOUR vision of "The Best Ride Of The Year"! Click the link below to get directly to the sign up form! Link to t ..read more

We sat down with Chris Evers, one of the brand managers working for the Swiss bike brand BIXS. It turns out that amongst many other things that have to get done in that role, a brand manager is also involved in deciding who to sponsor and which race team to support, and it was interesting to get a deep dive into Chris’ process, to hear what he is looking for in a rider and which metrics he is considering along the way. Of course we also chat about how Chris fell in love with the sport and what inspires and drives him to push on, the importance of a bike ride to clear your mind and our views on ..read more

Pascal sat down with Martin Shaperjack Stänz to continue our discussions around trail building and to find out where all the double black diamond tech trails are. Martin is a full-time builder and shaper in Davos, looking after the trails on Parsenn in the summer and the Jatzpark snowpark on Jakobshorn in the winter. He has a great perspective on the current state of affairs in trail building and it was interesting to hear his views on natural trails, progression of riders and builders, terrain, creativity, patience, bringing the right people to the table and, of course, the many challenges fa ..read more

We sat down with Louis Eisenhut and we are stoked to be sharing this episode with you! Most people know Louis as a creator on Instagram, Youtube and TikTok, and of course, we do get to hear about how he got started, what motivates him to continue creating new content and how he tries to stay relevant in the ever changing social media landscape. More importantly though, we also talk about how Louis is using his reach and experience in social media to achieve positive outcomes for the community and it was interesting to hear how he is trying to help the sport and trail building projects progress ..read more