Our Vision
Enable individuals to grow their potential in MTB while developing skills and experiences that are transferable to other areas of life.
Our Values
DirtCraft prioritizes fostering well-rounded individuals by integrating core values into their mountain biking programs. The progressing of these values are underpinned with two-way enjoyment, teamwork and respect. We acknowledge that family values may differ and encourage open communication to ensure the best coaching approach for each child.
These values include:
- Integrity: Honesty and goal setting. We believe in leading by example and demonstrating integrity by embodying all the values we teach.
- Independence: Critical thinking, self-sufficient, problem-solvers, but feel safe to ask for help when they need it.
- Courage: Riders process calculated risk-reward decision with appropriate confidence.
- Accountability: Riders take responsibility for their actions and learn from their mistakes. Riders are comfortable to make mistakes.
- Growth Mindset: Viewing challenges as opportunities for development. Riders accept no one is perfect, and approach challenge with a framework to improve themselves.
- Resilience: The ability to navigate adversity, uncertainty, pressure, change and fear while upholding their own values, but adapting to change as they grow into themselves.
- Self-Awareness: Stepping outside comfort zones and reflecting on strengths and weaknesses. For example, MTB trips push individuals to the extreme, teamwork, race pressures, logistical pressures and often tired individuals. It brings out true colours of the individual to enable them to reflect on who they are and how they fit into the world.
- Grit: Dedication and perseverance towards achieving goals. The world is a tough place, and we see hiding this as a disservice to young people. We introduce it in an age-appropriate manner throughout high school.
- Service: A capable person can identify a need for service and put steps in place to help resolve the issue. In DirtCraft there is organic service already occurring, fundraising events an opportunity, working bees and event volunteering. We are focused on expanding service opportunities and looking to event tie this in with employment and even career opportunities.
By instilling these values alongside mountain biking skills, DirtCraft aims to develop capable young people better prepared for life’s challenges. This is ingrained in all our services but primarily focused on in our Development Squad.
Contact
Mobile: 027 834 7223
Email: tristanhride@gmail.com
Mission Statement
Crafting cool kids into capable people.
Our Goals
- Grow individual competence in the sport.
- Enable transfer of the skills, experiences and confidence into life.
- Complete this process in an enjoyable and supported environment.
Our Origin
As a teenager, the future DirtCraft founder, Tristan Haycock always pondered why so many promising young athletes dropped out of competitive sport.
On his journey, Tristan achieved some outstanding successes including:
– Placing 1st at the U23 Endurance World MTB Championships at 17 in New Zealand.
– Raising funds throughout 2016 and 2017 to complete the 2017 Europe Campaign.
– Placing 2nd at the U23 endurance World MTB Championships in Italy 2017.
By this point Tristan had finished high school, completed university and realised he hadn’t developed the tools to continue progressing as a competitive athlete and struggled to transition these skills into other areas of life. Skills like time management, financial literacy, resilience, and more. It was at this point he realised there was much more to being an effective athlete than just train, race, recover, repeat. Thus, DirtCraft was established to assist other young athletes by developing skills and competence in the sport, alongside confidence understanding on how to apply these skills in wider life.
How we Operate
Please communicate how your family values and philosophies differ to DirtCraft.
All values and operating procedures are delivered in an age-appropriate manner.
We’ve learnt to develop a great athlete; you need to develop a great person. This is why we take the holistic approach. It also means that riders have a lot of skills and experience that they can take beyond the sport into other areas of life, education, work and family.
Coaching Style – Our coaches use a “guided discovery” approach, empowering riders to learn problem-solving skills through exploration and experimentation, but step in when the going gets tough or is high risk consequences. We aim to facilitate an environment where individuals can experience and learn from adversity without trauma.
Communication & Trust – Clear, honest and frequent communication between athlete, parents, coach and remainder of tight team (other coaches, sponsors, mentors) so that all parties are informed.
Sustainable & Consistent – The athlete development process is done in an enjoyable and sustainable way. This requires a healthy balance of fun, consistency and discipline throughout the process.
Safety – DirtCraft operates to the national standard as set out by WorkSafe and is Adventure mark accredited ensuring our practices are safe. We have Child Protection, Interaction Policy along with Health & Safety policies that are publicly viewable.
Loyalty – DirtCraft requires transparent and timely communication in scenarios where opportunities arise that may alter coach parent/athlete relationship. DirtCraft riders are expected to uphold DirtCraft values to the best of their ability.
Controllables – Any person has control over three things, what they think, what they do and how they do it.
Learning in the extremes – The extremes are where you can learn the most about yourself because there is less room to hide from who you are. This might be committing to training for a big race, completing a long ride, or digging deep in the last lap of an XC race. The more extreme the environment, the clearer the learning.
Fast learning loop – A capable person can read a situation they are experiencing/have experienced through a lens of the wider lessons available. This can shape their philosophy of the world and then be easily applied to other situations in their life in a timely fashion.
Our Partners for 2023
