Interview: Jason Boulle on racing in Europe, Lessons Learned & Plans for 2026
In 2025, Jason Boulle spent four months in Europe racing the Enduro World Series and the World Championships.
Earlier this year we did a Bike Check with him and now with the season completed, we connected to reflect on his first international campaign.
You’ve just completed your first Enduro season racing in Europe. How’d it go?
Jason: Indeed I have and what a rollercoaster ride it was! The plan, when Leslie (my wife) and I left South Africa, was to complete a full season of Enduro World Cup racing, as well as the 2025 World Championships if I were to be selected to compete for team RSA again. There were still plenty of uncertainties as to exactly how we were going to pull it off, especially in finances terms, but we took a literal leap of faith and the Lord provided all we needed in the end through many hoped for and also unexpected ways!
Over the 4 months I competed in seven Worlds cups across Italy, France, Poland and Austria, raced the World Championships in Switzerland, and spent five weeks in Andorra living and training out of our trusty Ford Transit. We clocked 12 000 km of travel in Europe (mostly by car), met some incredible new friends from all across the globe, and I got to race my bike against the best in the world in the most spectacular mountains. It was a truly incredible experience.
Jason: As for how it went, I would say it was a successful first season racing the World Cups for me. I learned a heap about what is required of a rider to compete at the highest level in Enduro, from the logistical challenges to the mental, mechanical, and physical ones as well. At the start of the season I had set myself the goal of finishing inside the top 30 at one of the World Cups and the World Champs. I didn’t manage to achieve this and that was a bitter pill to swallow initially, but after some reflection I am pleased with my results and progress across the season, especially given some of the logistical and financial challenges that we faced.
What was your best result and what ‘went right’ on that day?
Jason: On paper, 51st place at the La Thuile Enduro World Cup (Round 6 of 7) was my best race, followed closely by two 53rds at Round 7 and the World Championships. I hit Stage 1 of this race (which was over 7 minutes in total and began with 90 seconds of flat out pedalling) really aggressively. I hammered on the pedals through the technical flat terrain up top and then hung it out through the more gravity-fed lower portion. I had a few loose moments where I felt I could’ve ridden more patiently and controlled but it ended up being my best stage result of the season at 38th which I was really stoked to see!
I was happy with that start to the day and planned to carry that intensity through the remaining three stages and try to tidy up the technical riding a bit but slowly lost the intensity throughout the rest of the race. A bitter sweet day with promise of a result closer to the top 30 but the mental and physical fatigue got the better of me and I slipped down to 51st. Maintaining that intensity throughout the stages is something I’ve got to work on but all in all I was glad to be moving up the ranks a bit!
For you, what was the most challenging race track of your season and why?
Jason: That’s a tough call to make because each race had its unique challenges. Pietra Ligure was baking hot with huge days on the bike covering 60 km and 1600-1800m of climbing per day for four days. Poland hit us with 0-degree temperatures, snow, and rain. Leogang poured with rain in one of the most root-ridden locations of the series…not a good mix haha.
I think the World Champs course in Aletsch Arena, Switzerland, was the toughest at the end of the day. 32 minutes of racing across six stages, a mix of brutal rock gardens, knife-edge alpine trails, relentless gradients, and a lot of pedalling in the stages where every last watt was demanded of you. Staying on your bike and not blowing up physically or mentally was a true challenge! The stuff we race bikes for!
Europe has massive mountains and incredible trails that run through them. Of the tracks you raced on, which was your favorite and why?
Jason: That would be a close one between Loudenvielle in the French Pyrenees and Morillon in the French Alps. Both had some incredible steep and technical trails that made you feel like a hero when you rode them well, though Loudenvielle was arguably the better venue with views of snowcapped mountains surrounding the race village and a stunning lake to cool off in after racing!
How did you manage all the logistics that one has to deal with when racing abroad? Stuff like cooking, cleaning clothes and equipment, shopping, where to stay, routes to take and so on.
Jason: Two words; my wife! Leslie was an absolute champion throughout the whole season. She took charge of a lot of the logistics, meal planning and cooking, shopping, finding accommodation and many of the other details.
We spent the first month and a half bumming rides off of friends (of which Keagan Brand was an incredible help) and staying in accommodation at and between the races (which is very expensive!) until we were able to secure our own van in late June from the second hand market in Austria. The van had a queen-size bed in the back, some small cupboards, and five seats. Simple and just about all we needed.
From then on, majority of our nights were spent in the van in free parking spots or paid areas when necessary. We shared some time in accommodation with friends at Rounds five and seven and were hosted by Swiss racer Axel Bourquin and his generous family for a couple weeks between races. When staying in the van (about 70 nights of the 130 spent in Europe) we would cook on a two-plate gas cooker and wash our clothes, dishes, and bodies out of a bucket (or ideally a river if accessible) as there are seldom showers when free-camping. We’d use local cafes or libraries to charge laptops and access wifi for getting work done online.
We learned early on to set Google Maps to “avoid tolls” as much as possible. The drive from Annecy to Andorra alone (±10 hours) cost us around 250 Euro in tolls! To our pleasant surprise, the toll-free roads often took us through interesting towns and beautiful regions in the countryside that we didn’t mind the extra couple hours of travel.
Take us through the physical preparation you went through in the months leading up to your trip. You worked with one of the world’s best fitness coaches, – how’d that go? Is it costly? Was it worth it?
Jason: In November 2024 I signed up to work with Todd Schumlick of Perfom-X in order to prepare for the 2025 season as best as I could. Todd has trained the likes of Aaron Gwin, Richie Rude, Stevie Smith, and more, so I knew that I’d be in good hands.
It was the first time in my life that I’d done anything meaningful in the gym and I think I’ve certainly benefitted from that while still having a lot of room for growth there through consistency and building on what we’ve started this season.
Training comprised of three to four strength sessions in the gym per week and three cardio focussed sessions on the bike or rowing machine with additional skills-focused rides where I could fit them in. I had a pretty severe crash in February that interrupted the training routine and we launched into the main racing season as I was about ready to start working hard again so I wouldn’t have said my physical preparation for the season was ideal as a result of that.
Working with Perform-X was not significantly more expensive than any other quality local trainers and the confidence of having a proven system and process from the world’s best was worth any addition expense, I believe.
How was your body on race days? Did you experience any notable weaknesses or areas of strength and conditioning that you need to work on for the future?
Jason: The World Cups are brutal. The climbs are long and often very steep, resulting in riders pushing and carrying their bikes as much as pedaling them. The stages are so physically demanding due to the sheer length of them, the steep gradients, big impacts and rough terrain trying to rattle your hands of the bars the whole way down.
Better conditioning my hands and arms to those vibrations and repeated impacts is definitely a must. That takes time exposing yourself to long rough trails and doing exercises that push your grip strength. I also struggled with getting the most out of my legs when explosive pedaling was required in the stages, especially towards the end of a long day. I plan to do more race simulations in training to prepare better for this demand, big days on the bike with hard efforts on technical terrain thrown in.
From a skills point of view, what kind of preparation did you do before leaving and then once there, did you feel like you missed anything in this process?
Jason: Not enough if I’m honest. I got a bit too caught up in the strength and cardio sessions and didn’t make enough time for skills-focused training which I really need. During the mid-season break I spent more dedicated time in Andorra’s Bike Park working on body position, braking technique, and cornering skills in particular which was beneficial. At the moment, I’m using my Trek Rail+ Ebike to get loads of repeat laps in of shorter sections of trail while focusing on those key skills of body position, braking and cornering technique. Skills are a weak point of mine that I know I need to put time into working on.
Do you include much mental preparation into your training at all?
Jason: In the past, the mental side of racing has come quite naturally to me. I didn’t get over-stressed and I felt I could elevate my game really well when I dropped into each stage. This year was a different story, particularly at the World Cup events. I’m not sure if it was feeling the pressure of all the sacrifices that Les and I had made to be there but I was definitely putting more pressure on myself to perform and it did not help me do so.
I realised this at Round Five and managed to take some of that pressure off and focused on having fun on the bike, a state of mind that helps a lot of the best riders get the most out of themselves, especially in the risk-heavy gravity racing world. This made a significant difference for me and I was making good progress towards riding more committed and confidently whereas before I was often consciously anxious about crashing or performing poorly while trying to put down a race run.
The mental fatigue of a World Cup race week was also a new challenge for me to overcome. There’s a lot to manage mentally; from learning the stages with just one practice run, keeping a good media output, eating correctly on and off the bike, maintaining the bike (not a top skill of mine haha), and getting your body to give its all when it counts. I’ve got plenty of work to do in learning to manage this load in order to get the most out of myself on race day.
Enduro isn’t rugby, cricket or soccer where our international athletes enjoy tons of financial support from the governing bodies. How did you fund your trip and what is the full financial cost of doing it?
Jason: Hahaha, it is not indeed. The majority of the World Cup and local racing campaign was funded out of my and Les’ salaries ( we worked online throughout the season). On top of that we got some help from family and a couple of generous friends and then Omega Capital got on board as a financial sponsor halfway through the Europe trip which was a huge help!
The total cost of the four months in Europe for the two of us was around R270 000 (flights, travel, food, accommodation, bike maintenance, race entries). Financial stress was certainly the biggest stress that we faced throughout the season and it’s a small miracle that we managed the whole way through, haha. A big goal for this off-season is to get some more financial sponsors on board so that we can reduce that stress as much as possible next season and focus on the performance aspect.
Let’s talk bikes. You are a Trek athlete and rode a Slash. There’s nothing like a season in Europe to fully get to know a particular bike. For you, what was the most impressive feature and benefit on the Slash that aided you and then what in terms of setup would you change if you could wind the clock back and do it all again?
Jason: The Slash is a machine and it really came alive on those big European descents! It is a very downhill-orientated enduro bike and so when things got steep and rowdy, it really came into its own and looked after me a few times! For next season, I’m looking to hop onto the new Trek EX/LX for a package that is a bit more of an all-rounder to handle those big days and hopefully be a little quicker across the board, not just where it’s steep and gnarly.
Things I wish that I’d changed earlier in the season include cutting my bars down further from 770 to 760 mm in order to have a bit more wiggle room between trees and to make leaning the bike over a touch easier, and getting a little more front-end height with higher rise bars (currently on 38mm rise).
From a riding point, what does the rest of the 2025 calendar look like for you and do you have any racing plans for 2026?
Jason: I’ll be racing the Wines2Whales Pinotage on the Trek Rail+ with Matt Lombardi, hunting for that win and then the 3 Rivers Enduro down in the Eastern Cape on November 16th. A super fun event that’s worth the trip, they’ve got some ripper trails down there!
In 2026 I’ll be racing the full SA Cup Enduro series as well as the full World Cup series (which I believe Keira Duncan and Luca Zietsmann are planning to do as well). I’ll also try and squeeze in a couple of Downhills and a bit of XCO and gravel where I can. Bikes are class! //
| IMAGES: Leslie Boulle & Jason |