When discussing celebrated Australian Mountain Bikers, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone who wouldn’t mention the name Paul van der Ploeg. Paul has had a successful career across multiple cycling disciplines both in Australia and abroad. This includes earning himself the rainbow stripes in 2013 when he won the World Cross-Country Eliminator Championship.
Standing what can’t be far off 7-feet tall, this gentle giant is about as cheerful as they come, and when he’s not donning a number plate, you’ll often find him behind the mic offering expert analysis and commentary on events ranging from local XC races to the Olympics.
Paul or Vandy as he’s colloquially known, has undertaken a large part of his career aboard Giant Bikes. So when the news broke of his shift across to Focus Bikes, our journalistic senses were tingling with anticipation. With Vandy taking on a bigger role here at Flow hosting videos on our YouTube channel and reporting on the ground from events, we had to hear from the horse’s mouth how he’s adapting to the change and what makes up his fleet of new Focus Bikes.
He kindly obliged and ran us through all things Focus Bikes and what he has planned for the future!
Fresh fleet from Focus
“There was a real excitement of going into the unknown after riding the same suspension platform and bikes for the past 11 years,” he tells Flow.
Vandy has been putting his fleet of Focus’ through their paces since the start of this year — riding, racing and rolling all across the country. His stacked racing calendar and enviable home base at the foot of the Warbuton trails make for excellent conditions to test out his new toys….eerrrr….ummm….tools.
Meet the Jam²
The Jam² 8.9 has been his bike of choice for racing in the e-Bike classes, and according to Vandy, “it’s the perfect mixed-terrain bike, super capable and great on long rides.”
The Jam² is driven by a Bosch Performance Line CX E-Drive motor and powered by a 750Wh Battery, which is standard across most of the range. Vandy’s substantial Watt/Kg output means that he can push the motors and batteries of these bikes hard yet, they appear to be able to keep up with this man’s substantial engine.
“The Bosch motor has pretty amazing capacity, I’ve completed a 50km cross-country half marathon on the Jam² running it on turbo the whole time and still had 20% battery at the end of the race,” he explains.
This stead clearly suits his riding style and the proof is in the pudding — he won the Wild Penguin Quad Crown MTB Race and laid down the fastest time of the day at the Otway Odessey.
Introducing Vandy-Jam 8.8
The Jam 8.8 has been Vandy’s analogue race bike, bringing this rig out when he isn’t competing in the e-MTB class.
He says it’s been, “the perfect enduro race bike to have fun on and compete against mates who aren’t racing on e-Bikes.”
The 150mm front and rear beast is “a fast sturdy rig which climbs well and runs quick.”
While Vandy’s version is rather “tricked” out, Focus provides an impressive level of spec across their Jam range.
Sam this is Vandy, Vandy meet Sam
His other e-MTB is the Sam² 6.0, which is basically the Jam²’s bigger brother offering a 180mm fork and a 170mm rear powered by Bosch’s race motor. As a bigger bike Vandy has opted to use this predominantly for exploring trail networks.
“The Sam² is essentially a self-shuttle bike, the race motor is insane and the power transfer it provides is incredibly impressive. It’s a great bike to spend all day riding and boosting around the trails,” he says.
“It provides a confidence and sturdiness that’s different to the other bikes and has done a good job of scaring me because of how confident it makes you feel in the air. I’ve certainly had to check myself on a few solo rides before,” he laughs.
Exploring with Atlas
An Atlas 8.8 Gravel bike is the final piece in Vandy’s Focus bike puzzle…for now anyway. The Atlas is an all-rounder gravel bike, with it being his staple for gravel events and general shenanigans.
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“I’ve ridden it at RADL GRVL and the Beechworth Granite Classic, but it’s awesome for cruising around too. It’s been the bike of choice for the Bridge Road Brewers Ride Club in Melbourne, just grab the Atlas, rip some skids and have a bit of fun,” he explains.
While it hasn’t yet landed on Australian shores, a Vam² SL is on its way to join the fleet du Van De Ploeg. This rig is Focus’ lightweight, short-travel e-bike, offering a 130mm front and 125mm rear suspension set-up.
When quizzed on this model Vandy tells Flow, “there’s potential for it to be a super fun balance between an e-bike and a normal bike, given the shorter travel and light frame.”
We look forward to seeing this out on the trails or winning races in the near future!
Shifting Focus
Naturally, after beginning his professional career and riding Giant bikes for such an extended period of time, there’s an understandable comfort in how his bikes rode and were set up.
Yet, Vandy says it’s been a great experience, getting to know the new bikes and how they ride and handle.
“It’s been exciting to get on a new fleet of bikes with some different geometry, overall I’m super happy with how they’ve been set up and are riding,” he explains.
A life of racing and winning on mountain bikes gives Vandy a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn’t in his setup, and he tells Flow that the shift has been very enjoyable.
“The way that the suspension works on these Focus Bikes, you feel glued to the trails and having that additional traction gives you the confidence to be off the brakes more,” he says.
An enthused Vandy tells us that the super active rear end has meshed will with his riding style, and he’s been able to quickly adapted to new ride fell.
Getting into detail
In the hope of discovering some trade secrets to shave a few seconds off our own Strava times, we asked Vandy to disclose the key parts to his bikes’ cockpit and suspension set-up.
To go with his Shimano XTR trail brakes, he’s running 203mm rotors front and rear. Being a big rider, and travelling at considerable speed, the big anchors should not come as a surprise.
“I use the XTR trail brakes across the e-Bikes as I’m not too worried about weight as opposed to the race versions,” he explained.
As far as cockpits go, Vandy runs 780mm wide bars and jokes that if the trees on his local trails weren’t so tight he’d probably go with 800mm.
Vandy’s trusty steeds all run Schwalbe tyres, with Magic Mary Super Trail front and Tacky Chan Super Gravity rear, both in 2.4in.
We broached the topic of suspensions earlier, as far as the boingers themselves go, Vandy has opted for air shocks across all of his bikes these days.
“The technology on air shocks these days is amazing, as well as the adjustability they offer on the fly, it’s such a massive advantage for me,” he says.
The set up of his front suspension has been guided by the friendly folks at Fox Australia, sticking pretty close to the recommended settings for his weight.
Related:
- Flow’s guide for setting up your Fox fork | Suspension Tuning Tips Pt.1
- Flow’s guide for setting up your Fox shock | Suspension Tuning Tips Pt.2
So what’s next?
Vandy is certainly testing the capabilities of his new steeds, having already completed a plethora of multi-discipline events in the first half of the year with plenty more to come!
With nary a spare weekend, he tells Flow that flying the Focus flag at events around the country has been a fairly seamless change.
“I’ve enjoyed chatting to people at various events about Focus and their range of bikes. The company is very community-orientated and loves getting people on bikes and out into nature riding trails, so it’s been nice to help promote that,” he says.
Vandy’s pack race calendar has already seen him compete in RADL GRVL, Victorian Gravity Enduro Series, Wild Penguin Quad Crown and the Fox Super Flow races to name but a few.
“It’s been a busy start to the year, however the second half is just as busy and there’s plenty of events I’m looking forward to,” he says.
Upcoming events will include the 100km Noosa Enduro Marathon in July, the Quad Crown race in Eden and also the Focus sponsored Shimano Gravel Muster taking place in August in Alice Springs.
If that wasn’t enough, Vandy hinted at a possible European adventure to check out Focus’ Head Office in Germany — the man is busy!
