Elliot is working alongside me at some events and venues but mostly offering the DIalled Services in the FOD, BPW, The Pearce Cycles venues in the Midlands and more. Here is is little more about him:
My First Blog:
"Now you’ll have to bear with me because this is the first time writing anything like this, but hopefully, this gives you a bit of an insight into me and my journey here, enjoy.
I’m 24, from the Midlands and love all things outdoors. At the weekends you’ll either find me working, racing, running, hiking or out with my mates playing on bikes in the woods, like most of us!!
My passion for all things adrenalin-fueled began at a small age and I grew up racing quad bikes from the age of 5, we had to tell organisers a ‘little white lie’ about my age in order for me to be able to race. From here I had a great time racing quads all the way through to adult categories. I had an awesome time delving into engines, setups and race craft. Over the years we developed a good system for finding out what worked for us, most of the time.
I had huge success racing quad bikes, doing British Championship enduro races from 3-8hrs, motocross-style 3x20min motos and the Beach Races in the UK. I’ve competed all over the UK and in France.
Each weekend's racing was different and on the journey home on a Sunday evening, I’d love to pick apart all the different components of each race with my parents and brother. To get a better understanding of things I’d be in the garage watching Dad and asking questions. How things went together and why, and problem-solving when things went wrong. This set me up well to understand my quad and by 12 years old I was able to take out an engine ready for Dad to put a different one in for the next weekend. I loved learning about all the internals and how different setups could work in different conditions.
I’ve always wanted to make things go quicker and work better! This led me to Oxford Brookes University, and four years later, a 1st class degree in Motorsport Engineering. Here I learnt 3D CAD design, FEA Analysis, race car set-up, and the maths behind thermodynamic systems and engine power.
At this point I should probably mention mountain bikes…they’ve always been a part of me, I can’t remember a time in my life when a bicycle didn’t exist. At the quad race meetings, along with my brother and mates, any spare time would either be trying to jump the motocross jumps on our mountain bikes, or setting up dodgy ramps and trying to jump as many people as possible!!
But, then in 2011, something changed…I saw Danny Hart's World Championship winning run in Champéry Switzerland (Click here if you need a reminder) In December later that year, I entered my first DH race. I quickly realised racing DH was a completely different ball game. Still, I was hooked. I couldn’t get enough of the industry. I read every bike magazine there was out there (back when they used to print) and anxiously awaited every new review and piece of bike tech information.
My passion grew more and more, not only because of the fun I was having racing but the cool places I could go on two wheels and all the experiences that go with it. I’ve now been racing 11 years and mainly compete in enduros but still love a good DH. Picking apart the puzzle at the end of a race weekend is still what I love and has taken a long time to work out for myself. As you know, mountain biking is extremely mentally taxing and physically demanding, however with so many variables in bike racing you can never be certain and that’s where good set-up comes into it, and the big part it plays.
After delving deeper into the set-up side of things at university along with my huge passion for bikes there was only one thing my dissertation was going to be based on, Mountain Bike Suspension.
This enabled me to delve further into gaining a deeper understanding of how bikes and their different linkages work, what things affect ride characteristics like anti-squat, pedal kickback and anti-rise and how each of them can be quantified. I put shocks on the dyno to see how the heat affected damping over a time period, this allowed me to make my own judgement on what the bike industry was trying to sell me. I collected tyre stiffness data and modelled bikes in 3D going off drops and being pedalled to analyse their efficiency and suspension performance.
My time at university also showed me how much I didn’t want to sit in front of a computer, I could just about manage it for my dissertation as that revolved around bikes. However, I’m a person who would rather be out doing things. After finishing university in 2020 in the middle of lockdown I managed to get a job trail building in South Wales for Trail Evolution.
From here I set about trying to look for a graduate engineering job in the bike industry…there aren’t many at all. I did find one though with Atherton Bikes. However, unfortunately, after the interview stage, it was not to be. Rob Gow, Head Design Engineer at Atherton Bikes was extremely kind to me and explained the situation to me and some of the reasoning behind their decision. Still, I was gutted. After e-mailing countless companies and not getting much in return, I was getting tired.
I had written about telemetry in mountain biking back when I was still in school and had seen it develop over the years before it became a consumable product. After my disappointing interview result, I then realised that youth is on my side and if I start in the industry now then maybe 10 years down the line I might have something respectable. This lead me to get in touch with Dave early in 2021 who was running Dialled by himself at this point. I’d seen his brand and what he was doing and it was a dream for me to eventually have something similar to that. Now, I didn’t want to insult Dave as he has built his own business through working hard and therefore made it very clear that he didn’t have to share anything with me. However, after a couple of emails and a couple of phone calls, he must have decided he liked me…lucky me! Dave was offering me a proposal that was too good to miss. I will never forget the evening I received that email. I was driving back from work and was so stoked. I genuinely could not believe the level of kindness and the opportunity Dave was offering me. It was my dream and it was coming alive!
Dave has since trained me on the software and bolstered my bike understanding and knowledge whilst continuing to offer an endless amount of support to help me in the short time we’ve been working together. For this, I’ll always be grateful and it goes to show what a cool industry Mountain biking is!
Whether it’s sharing data, talking race results, conditions and setups I love continuing to figure out each puzzle, much like I used to on the way back from a quad race meeting. Except that now I’m trying to do it for the customers we work with and I love it.
And that’s me for now. I’ll see you at the races or out in the hills!
Cheers Elliot "
If you are interested in setting up a similar arrangement to Elliot, then I think there is scope to take Dialled to the South East, South West, Scottish borders and Fort William. Get in touch if you think you have what it takes.
