How a World Cup MTB Race Team Operates, with Trek Factory Racing

Singletracks Mountain Bike Podcast

Singletracks.com

Sports, Wilderness

4.7 • 574 Ratings

🗓️ 14 March 2023

⏱️ 50 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Matt Shriver is the General Manager and technical director for the Trek Factory Racing cross country team and is based in Durango Colorado. He’s a former pro rider himself and previously served as the technical director for the Trek WorldTour road team for seven years.

How did you make the transition from professional racing to managing race teams?
What are the responsibilities of a pro team liaison?
Does Trek Factory Racing provide coaching resources to athletes, or do athletes tend to bring their own training team?
Some pro teams are organized as collectives, while others like Trek Factory Racing seem to lean on more of a team model. Are there different philosophies among the different racing groups in MTB?
Is mountain biking a team sport? Is there a lot of strategy in MTB racing?
How does recovery work between races? Is there much downtime for the staff and athletes in between events?
How are team athletes selected?
What is the most stressful part of being a team liaison?
How intrusive are anti-doping protocols for athletes and staff?
How does a brand like Trek measure the success of their race team?
Do you think the current international MTB competition model is sustainable?
For core mountain bikers who love riding but don’t necessarily follow pro racing, why should they start paying attention to races? What can we learn from watching World Cup competitions?

In an upcoming episode we'll also talk with Ryan from the Trek Factory Racing DH team.

Keep up with the Trek Factory Racing team at racing.trekbikes.com. Photo credit: Trek Factory Racing.

The Singletracks podcast is brought to you by TPC -- The Pro’s Closet. Spring is the perfect time to upgrade, and TPC has an industry-leading selection of new and Certified Pre-Owned bikes, plus frames, wheels and accessories. Each Certified, Pre-Owned bike is inspected, tested and serviced, and every bike includes thirty day returns. Visit tpc.bike/singletracks and enter code Singletracks40 to save forty dollars on every order over two hundred.

Transcript

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0:00.0	The Single Tracks podcast is brought to you by TPC, the Proz Closet.
0:05.0	Spring is the perfect time to upgrade, and TPC has an industry-leading selection of new and certified pre-owned bikes, plus frames, wheels, and accessories.
0:15.1	Each certified pre-owned bike is inspected, tested, and serviced, and every bike includes 30-day returns. Visit tPC.bike
0:23.7	forward slash single tracks and enter code single tracks 40 to save $40 on every order over 200.
0:31.0	That's the pros closet at tpc.bike slash single tracks and look for the link and coupon code in the show notes.
0:39.3	Hey everybody, welcome to the single tracks podcast. My name is Jeff and today my guest is Matt
0:45.1	Shriver. Matt is the general manager and technical director for the Trek factory racing cross
0:51.8	country team and is based in Durango, Colorado.
0:55.4	He's a former pro rider himself and previously served as the technical director for the
1:00.6	Trek World Tour Road Team for seven years.
1:04.1	Thanks for joining us, Matt.
1:09.2	Yeah, so tell us how you made the transition from professional racing to managing race teams.
1:17.8	It's a good question. There's definitely not a, there's definitely not a roadmap for that and these kind of roles.
1:26.2	But really the things that were important to a job like this
1:32.4	are, you know, some technical background. So growing up in bike shops, working on bikes,
1:38.9	you know, just a real knowledge of the equipment that we use to race.
1:46.5	And then knowledge of racing, of course.
1:48.9	Yeah.
1:49.1	The riders definitely use the equipment different than most customers.
1:53.7	So, yeah, just knowing how racers use that kind of equipment.
1:58.6	And being a bike racer, that really helps you, right?
2:02.1	Yeah.
	...

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