In September 2025, Tyler Jacobs became the first South African woman to ever win a medal at the UCI Mountain Bike World Championships short track race. Three years earlier, she was getting dropped by her dad and her brothers on Sunday rides and crying about having to go.

Tyler is 21. She rides for Liv Factory Racing out of the United States, trains out of Stellenbosch with coach Barry Austin, and in 2026 added the South African Elite Women's Road Race Championship to her name in her final year as an Under-23. A month after Worlds, she won her first UCI World Cup — the U23 XCC at Lake Placid — on the global debut of Liv's new Pique Prototype. The frame has "factory test prototype frame number 4" printed on the side of it. She's one of only four people in the world riding one.

In this episode of The Active Hobo Podcast: Femme Series, Tyler sits down to talk about nine years growing up in Nairobi, being the kid who had to be pumped up and packed for rides she didn't want to go on, meeting Ty White at the Drive Academy in Ballito in 2022 and everything that followed, getting picked up by Liv in Leogang after running the last half lap with a smashed wheel, what the Matterhorn podium actually felt like, and why she describes herself as "the most unserious person" her roommate has ever met — except during intervals.

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0:00 ★ Meet Tyler: historic Worlds bronze, Lake Placid World Cup winner

1:00 ★ Born in Umhlanga, moved to Nairobi at nine

2:42 ★ Home-schooled, always active, never serious about the bike

7:07 ★ 2022: meeting Ty White and Drive Academy in Ballito

10:14 ★ The Holla Trails sprint the locals call "World Champs"

12:09 ★ Why the European field is a different sport

18:00 ★ The SA pipeline: what's working, what isn't

24:36 ★ Living and training in Stellenbosch

24:57 ★ Coach Barry Austin and learning to use the course, not just the power

27:22 ★ Winning SA Elite Women's Road Champs by being bored

31:40 ★ How a smashed wheel and a run to the finish got her a Liv contract

34:27 ★ Brazil, Harry and Lloyd, and finishing 5th-6th as teammates

35:57 ★ Worlds 2025: rice and Nutella, then the podium

38:41 ★ The first McDonald's of her life

40:30 ★ Inside Liv Factory Racing

48:35 ★ The Austrian team house

49:14 ★ Cape Town Cycle Tour and the state of SA women's racing

52:37 ★ The XCO goal: top three in 2026

Errin Mackridge was told after the 2024 UCI World Championships that she was an embarrassment to South Africa. She was 17, racing at her first Worlds, and she didn't finish. The people who said it weren't racing. They were typing.

She has six national titles now. Four on the mountain bike, two on the road. She is the reigning Junior South African Road Race Champion — a title she's won in back-to-back years, 2024 and 2025. She represented South Africa at the 2025 UCI Road World Championships in Kigali. And in August, she boards a plane to Banner Elk, North Carolina, to race for Lees-McRae College — one of the most successful collegiate cycling programmes in the United States, and the same programme that has produced the likes of Brent Bookwalter.

In this episode of The Active Hobo Podcast: Femme Series, Errin sits down to talk about the gap between SA racing and the European fields where the real depth lives, what Ty White has built at the Drive Academy in Ballito that keeps producing national champions, the sprint the Ballito locals jokingly call their "Holla Champs," and what it costs — financially, emotionally, and physically — to chase a professional contract from the bottom of Africa.

🔗 Scicon Sports SA — Premium eyewear and luggage for cyclists who take their kit seriously. https://theactivehobo.short.gy/sciconsports-discount

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0:00 ★ Meet Errin: six national titles at 18

1:28 ★ First title, red jersey, and a second-place that started everything

3:09 ★ 2024 — the year that changed the trajectory

4:09 ★ Winning SA Road Champs with Megan Botha in a two-up breakaway

6:03 ★ The deep pool of SA women's cycling nobody talks about

8:00 ★ Ty White, the Drive Academy, and the culture of winning

9:40 ★ Culture as the multiplier: why humility shows up in the results

10:40 ★ Road vs mountain bike: why XCO always wins

12:35 ★ The gap between SA and Europe is real, and it's money

14:12 ★ Lees-McRae College, North Carolina: the plan

19:29 ★ "I was told I'm an embarrassment to South Africa"

22:50 ★ Nutrition, Hexis, low-cadence intervals, and Holla Champs sprints

30:57 ★ Who she'll race at SA XCO Champs in Bloemfontein

32:29 ★ The kit she takes stateside, and why Maxxis stays

In 2023, Shanae Williams qualified for the Olympic pathway with a silver at the African Games. Then she got sick. Pushed through. Her heart gave in. Doctors pulled her out of training for six months — and she spent that time asking herself whether she wanted to do any of this ever again.

She's now the 2025 Africa Elite Women's Triathlon Champion over Olympic distance, the 2025 Africa Sprint Champion, a four-time SA Sprint National Champion, and a Birmingham 2022 Commonwealth Games representative for South Africa. Not bad for someone who started out as a water polo player and synchronised swimmer, and whose first proper triathlon involved renting a bike, riding ten minutes the day before, and racing with basic cage pedals because she'd never ridden a road bike in her life.

In this episode of The Active Hobo Podcast: Femme Series, Shanae sits down to talk about the unlikely path from a Cape Town school pool to the World Triathlon Championship Series, why the hardest six months of her life ended up being the most clarifying, what it takes to chase an Olympic dream from a country that barely publicises the sport she competes in, and why she's spending the next two years pointing everything at Los Angeles 2028.

🔗 Scicon Sports SA — Premium eyewear and luggage for cyclists who take their kit seriously. https://theactivehobo.short.gy/sciconsports-discount

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0:00 ★ Meet Shanae: Africa's Elite Women's Triathlon Champion

2:07 ★ From water polo and synchronised swimming to the Cape Town waterfront

3:04 ★ Renting a bike the day before her first World Series schools challenge

9:21 ★ The decision to go all-in after high school

11:23 ★ Why the swim is the hardest part — and why it made her career

14:37 ★ How World Triathlon actually works (and why it isn't Ironman)

20:20 ★ Commonwealth Games Birmingham 2022

25:00 ★ The sport nobody in South Africa is allowed to see

28:20 ★ Transitions, mounting at speed, and the cost of a pinky toe over the line

29:45 ★ African Games silver, food poisoning, and the Olympic qualifier that got away

30:54 ★ Six months off the bike: the heart virus that almost ended it

33:34 ★ Why she didn't quit — and what 2028 looks like

34:21 ★ Moving home: why happy athletes are faster athletes

41:54 ★ Shoes, sponsors and the art of rotating gear

51:00 ★ Falling in love with Cape Town cycling culture

Wout van Aert won his first Paris-Roubaix — and we watched it unfold on a big screen at the start of a gravel stage race in the middle of the Klein Karoo. That tells you everything about this episode.

This is The Breakaway's Garden Route Giro special edition. Recorded live from the stage 2 finish line at the inaugural GRG, with riders, locals, and dogs walking through shot. We break down how Van Aert outsprinted Pogačar in the Roubaix velodrome, why UAE's tactics fell short, what Van der Poel's double puncture on the Arenberg and his pedal drama with Jasper Stuyven cost him, and what it means that the most dominant rider in the world just got beaten. Then we turn to the women's race — Franziska Koch's breakthrough win and Visma-Lease a Bike landing two riders on the podium — and ask whether it's time women's Classics got their own dedicated broadcast window.

But the heart of this episode is what's happening right here on the ground. Dave is two days into his first ever stage race. Oakdale High School turned out to welcome riders with songs and pride. Douglas Ryder, Kent Main, and some of the biggest names in South African cycling are all here — on gravel, in small towns, sharing beers at railway station bars. This is what community looks like when you build the right format for it. And we think gravel stage racing might just be the future of our sport.

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0:00 — Live from the Garden Route Giro finish line

★ 0:57 — Paris-Roubaix 2026

★ 09:13 — Paris-Roubaix Ladies

★ 13:20 — Upcoming Road Races

★ 15:26 — Garden Route Giro

★ 25:30 — What's next for Cam (Q36.5)

In this episode of The Active Hobo Podcast, Maddy talks about training out of Ballito, the day her chain came off at SA Road Champs and she still won, what it's like lining up against 66 girls on a European start line, and why she's skipping university to chase a UCI World Cup dream.

At her first SA Championships, Madison Bateson didn't know it was the SA Champs. She thought it was a regular KZN race, showed up at Cascades, saw girls in provincial kit she didn't recognise, and only clicked that morning. She won it anyway. She was in the Sprog category — the youngest competitive age group in South African mountain biking.

0:00 ★ Meet Maddy: 16 years old, 2026 SA Junior Champion

3:00 ★ The school that bends for bike training

4:35 ★ Getting more girls on the start line: the school series effect

10:00 ★ Training alongside Tyler Jacobs and chasing the World Cup

14:43 ★ Her chain came off at SA Road Champs. She still won.

25:59 ★ Holla Trails, Ballito, and the sprint they call "World Champs"

41:22 ★ How she ended up riding Tyler Jacobs' old bike

47:09 ★ 66 girls on a European start line

52:21 ★ Life after school: going overseas, no plan B

She was a law student at Rhodes University when she drew some cartoons to win a bicycle. That bicycle changed everything.

Tegan Phillips is an adventurer, ultra-endurance cyclist, comic artist, and content creator who has spent the last decade doing the things most people only talk about — cycling through Africa with her family, completing a solo triathlon around New Zealand's South Island, and attempting to set the women's world record for the fastest ride from Cairo to Cape Town. That record attempt nearly killed her. In this conversation, Tegan shares the raw, unfiltered story of what happened in the Egyptian desert — losing her speech, having a seizure, and the moment she had to decide whether to call her parents to say goodbye or fight to stay alive. She also opens up about the quiet years that followed: waitressing, living with her 94-year-old great aunt in a tiny apartment, and rebuilding from nothing. Now based in Spain near Ashleigh Moolman Pasio's Rocacorba Cycling, Tegan reflects on what it means to respect risk, why comics and content creation come from the same creative impulse, and why the conversation around women in cycling needs men to do more than just not exclude.

This is a story about doing hard things, falling apart, and finding a reason to keep going.

🎒 Follow Tegan: @teganphillipscomics

🛒 Get 15% off premium cycling luggage & eyewear at Scicon Sports SA → https://theactivehobo.short.gy/sciconsports-discount

00:00:00 — "My Favourite Person in the World"

00:04:03 — A Spinning Assistant Discovers Cycling

00:06:38 — 1,400km to the Namibian Border and Back

00:09:00 — The Year That Changed Everything (Family Africa Trip)

00:13:29 — The Sedgefield 500 and Falling in Love with Ultra Endurance

00:16:52 — 10 Ironmans Around New Zealand's South Island

00:22:48 — Writing the Book About All of It

00:29:18 — "I Think I'm Going to Die" (The Cairo to Cape Town Attempt)

00:37:01 — Rebuilding in Spain: Rocacorba and a New Chapter

00:43:38 — Tempering Steel: The Lesson That Stays

00:46:39 — From Comics to Content Creation

00:48:17 — Turning Sexist Comments into Comedy Gold

00:51:42 — Women in Cycling: Why It's Not a Women's Issue

00:59:14 — Exclusion Isn't a Rule — It's Invisible Barriers

This episode opens in a place none of us wanted to go. Another cyclist lost on South African roads. Dave, Cam and Sarah speak honestly about what that means as riders, as parents, as a community — and what actually needs to change for the laws to protect us.

Then: Tadej Pogačar wins the Tour of Flanders and becomes the first rider in history to win four consecutive Monuments. The crew breaks down the race, the Pogačar-Van der Poel-Evenepoel dynamic, the railway crossing controversy, and why the women's race might have been even more exciting, with Demi Vollering putting on a masterclass.

And the heart of this episode: a viewer-suggested deep dive into the psychology of suffering. Sarah breaks down the real difference between pain and suffering, why your pain threshold and pain tolerance are two completely different things, and how the art of distraction might be the most powerful tool you've never used on race day. Cam and Dave share their own dark-place strategies — from breathing resets to finding familiar faces in the crowd.

🔗 Scicon Sports SA — Premium eyewear and luggage for cyclists who take their kit seriously. https://theactivehobo.short.gy/sciconsports-discount

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00:00 — Welcome & Coffee at Active Hobo

00:02:17 — The Conversation We Need to Have: Road Safety in South Africa

00:06:04 — Situational Awareness: What Dave Taught His Son on Their First Road Ride

00:11:11 — Consequences, Laws & What Needs to Change

00:18:22 — Don't Stop Riding — Why the Fight Is Worth It

00:19:36 — Tadej Pogacar Wins Flanders: Four Consecutive Monuments (A First in History)

00:28:07 — The Record Nobody's Broken — Can He Win All Five in One Season?

00:29:10 — Women's Flanders: Demi Vollering's Decisive Move

00:36:28 — Same Day, Different Races — Should Women's Classics Be Separate?

00:41:27 — The Railway Crossing Controversy

00:45:00 — Paris-Roubaix Preview

00:46:28 — Mental Health for Athletes: The Psychology of Suffering

00:47:51 — Pain vs Suffering — What's the Difference?

00:54:30 — Pain Threshold vs Pain Tolerance (And Why It Matters for Everyone)

00:58:08 — The Art of Distraction: Your Most Powerful Tool in a Dark Place

01:02:11 — Breathing Resets, Small Wins & Marginal Gains for the Mind

01:04:12 — Chappies Update: Easter Weekend Edition

01:04:37 — Garden Rijero Preview: Live Daily Podcasts From the Race

He failed most of his subjects, raced mountain bikes on three different pro teams, and still never had the breakthrough he dreamed of. So at 23 years old, with R15,000 and a plan scribbled after six months of marketing studies, Jurgens Uys walked away from everything he knew — and started making socks.

Ten years later, Versus Socks has sold over 6 million pairs, employs more than 50 people, and runs community events that draw 20,000 signups. But this isn't really a story about socks. It's about what happens when a farm kid from Lourensford with ADHD, a competitive fire, and zero backup plan decides to build something that matters — one brick in the wall, every single day.

In this conversation, Jurgens sits down with David Jenkins to trace the full arc: growing up watching the Cape Epic roll past his front door, the heartbreak of never quite making the podium, the moment his business partner said "let's go 50/50," and the wild ride from a parents' garage in Stellenbosch to a world-class production facility in Kuils River. He talks about running a business like a sports team, why there are no side hustles allowed, the viral banana socks moment, and why he still believes the best is yet to come.

🔗 Versus Socks: https://www.versussocks.com

📲 Jurgens on Instagram: @jurgensuys1

🧦 Support our friends at Scicon Sports SA — get 15% off with code ACTIVEHOBO at https://theactivehobo.short.gy/sciconsports-discount

If this story inspired you, subscribe, share it with someone building something of their own, and leave a comment — what would you build if there was no backup plan?

00:00:00 — Welcome to The Active Hobo

00:01:20 — Growing Up on a Farm Where Cape Epic Rolled Past

00:02:05 — ADHD, Ritalin, and Finding Identity on a Bike

00:02:49 — First Pro Contract: A Small Salary and a Dream

00:05:02 — "There Was a Monopoly" — Spotting the Gap

00:07:48 — Going 50/50 with Hanno: No Side Hustles, No Backup Plan

00:09:26 — 260 Orders Before They Had a Product

00:12:34 — The Sportsman's Warehouse Breakthrough

00:17:00 — "The Most Loved Sports Sock Brand in the World"

00:19:01 — How Paul Roos Shaped the Man Behind the Brand

00:23:03 — 50% Motivated, 50% Scared of Losing

00:25:06 — Kevin Evans, David George, and the Heroes on the Doorstep

00:29:52 — Choosing Business Over the Yellow Jersey

00:32:40 — "We're Not a Family — We're a Sports Team"

00:39:05 — When Cycling Saves the Leader

00:41:02 — R15,000 Each and a Boot Full of Socks

00:46:27 — The Swiss Knife Partner and Learning to Let Go

00:51:57 — Knowing When to Fire Yourself as CEO

00:55:57 — Banana Socks and the Moment Versus Went Viral

01:03:19 — Nerdy Sock Tech: 200 Needles and Seamless Machines

01:06:42 — The AI Sock Designer That Changed Everything

01:07:24 — 4,000 Pairs a Day: Inside the New Kuils River Facility

01:17:18 — Why They'll Never Be an Events Company (But Run the Best Events)

01:22:05 — Back to Base: 20,000 People, 50K in 10 Days

01:24:02 — The Versus Road Run Party: 7,500 Runners in Stellenbosch

01:25:51 — "What If There's No Ceiling?"

01:27:06 — The Floodgates Are Open