Robin Schmitt

A few days of relaxed riding through Patagonia 💆 😅 Thank you @eliseo_miciu for the epic photos and your wonderful support ❤️‍🔥 @passoftears

It’s always easy to criticize an industry, its behavior, its problems. The harder question is: who is actually willing to change something? Who is willing to lead by example? After publishing the 11 Brixen Papers, it would have been easy to stop there. But we didn’t. We’re just getting started. The first 41 Leadership Summit became far more than we hoped for. It marked a turning point – and sparked concrete action around what this industry needs to become next. Big shout out to everyone who showed up with honesty, openness, and courage. Things are moving. Thanks to our entire 41 team, the Staud Studios and also to our mayor @ob.leonberg for a very inspirational speech! Read the full article – and what’s next – here: /en/we-dont-need-better-bikes-we-need-a-better-bike-industry/

FITTING ROOM When you need bigger shoes because life‘s making you grow soooo much 🥰 5 days in California, so many welcomes, so many blessings. Thanks @ktaoki for being by my side and starting to paint this big white paper with me. Everything‘s working out big time ❤️‍🔥🔥

Sunday in the office ❤️‍🔥 Can’t wait for next week. All prepped! Our Top100 Leadership Summit will be by far the best event yet. Great attendees from Asia, Europe, the Americas and even different industries to complete perspectives. The Brixen Papers analyzed what’s broken the bike world and how much power we waste. But analyzing and talking is not enough anymore. Next week we’ll reveal what’s been cooking, take action, change rules and shift conversations. I‘m so grateful to have such a bold and strong team ready to build better. Sunday in the office and on the trails was fun already, bring on Monday 💥 We‘ll rock this.

„Are you kidding? You just learnt horse riding and signed up for this?“ Yep, 7 Months before @passoftears I took my first horse riding class. For some that probably sounds crazy – like signing up for Paris-Dakar right after getting your driver’s license. For me, it didn’t feel like that. It was more about deeply trusting myself and my ability to learn. It’s easy, but as we grow we forget how to learn like a kid and how fast learning can be: No big plan, no overthinking. Just fun, curiosity, and going with what feels right. So my strategy was pretty simple: put myself into as many different situations as possible, ride as many different horses, terrains and learn different riding cultures in different countries. And use it as an excuse to see new places along the way. So besides 10 classes in my hometown I took 2 trips to the dolomites to learn how to ride exposed, steep and rocky terrain, 1 trip to Morocco for specific multiday training as well as bareback and training how to crash. And over new year’s an another one to Egypt for fullspeed gallops and a lot of yallah through the desert. In the end, I just tried to make the whole thing one thing: fucking fun. It wasn’t always easy sailing, but all of it was so wonderful: so many new friends, so many new opportunities, so many new perspectives, sore muscles from laughing, facing fears, learning another level of leadership, horsemanship and even making the drives to the Dolomites mindblowing with ferrari type of horse fun. Here are a few moments from that journey. Thanks to everyone for cheering me on, believing in me and welcoming me into the world of horses.

@passoftears was a wonderful rollercoaster 🥰 Video snippets in random order. Shoutout to @lhsi_1561 and @daisysoames for their camping setups and great company 🫰

Over 5.000km of real world testing, lab tests and benchmarking in 8 new eMTBs with the new avinox M2S. Head over to @ebike_mtb to read all the reviews and deep dives! It was a brutal team effort – thanks to @benedikt.sdt and the entire team for making the impossible possible and setting the bar that high 🔥 @eigemann @robdadop @jpmtb_05 @walkenpeter @juansi Reynaldo @ingo_484 @maxphilipschmitt @manneschmitt Susanne @itskvn92 💪💪💪💪

Can’t get the Gaucho out of me. 🐎❤️‍🔥🇦🇷 @abnorm.space

15.000 USD to enter the race, sleep like rats and bring your own food? Add the cost of travel, prep and equipment… isn’t that too much? We discussed this a lot and my takeaway is that I‘d have payed even more for this. I know – and so do the organizers – for the last group that might be different, but I can only speak for me: between price and value is a huge difference that we easily confuse. The value of @passoftears is not any type of comfort, but the discomfort. The greatest is what you need to become to finish this seriously insane and raw event. The value of who you‘ll have become afterwards –if not just done physically but primarily mentally and spiritually. The demons, doubts and emotions you faced, the growth and capability you earn, your very own way of choosing how to cope with adversity, the inspiration you can give to others. Finishing the race is not the end – it is the start for new friendships around the world, new adventures and (business) ideas. Add on top the exploration, the places you‘d have never visited else, the deep dive into 100% real gaucho culture and seeing how what we consider crazy is for some local gauchos just „normal“. I encountered so much open heartedness from the locals that I want to take into my everyday life, the guitar music and singing at every estancia, the silent care and support without needing to ask. Valuing a warm place to sleep and a roof above you – no matter if it is next to logs, a broken mountain hut, mices or next to a hanging dead lamb… your reference points, perspectives and with it gratitude change in a just a day. You expand your reality beyond our shrunken reality in comfy western society. And don’t forget: the crazy logistics in this very remote (10hrs in car from the far away airport of Calafate) area, the helicopter, the great team of vets and medics and all the locals to support this. Hats off & thank you to @jakotango , @negromassuh and @rama.gregorio as well as everyone involved for being crazy enough to pull this off. We need more rawness in our lives – our comfort and separation from nature kills us. And chapeau to all the racers – just entering is pretty insane… or now our new normal?!

TAKE AWAY. Roasted Banana Porridge Canter, Egg Gallop, Beef Jerky Teriyaki Canter, Apple Trott, Almond Canter, Carrot Walk… @passoftears was the perfect training camp for Uber Eats on horses. What food and drinks are missing in the last slide???

DAKAR CALLING 🫣 @passoftears didn’t end on the way home – 2 breakdowns, 12 hours and 1 rap battle later we made it from the finish line to el Calafate. Learning: The adventure isn’t over till it’s over – luckily everyone had many training days of facing adversity so it was long but a lot of fun ❤️‍🔥 Putos amos!!

WINNING IS NOT ABOUT WHAT THEY TOLD YOU. Feel alive and do things your way - and you’ve already won. Anywhere you go. Life is a perspective. Find the beauty and joy in everything you do, and it all becomes easier. There’s so much to be thankful for in everything we do - yet it’s so easy to overthink the negative and give it more space than it deserves. But why not overthink the positive instead? Everyone can learn this. We can’t always change what we face and look at, but we can choose what we see in it. Grit, struggle, desperation, doubt and exhaustion - they were a huge part of the Pass of Tears. But they are also the rain for the rainbow. If we want ease, joy, and bliss, we need to be ready to face the opposite - like feeling weak after a workout before your muscles grow. My strategy for the Pass of Tears was simple: keep my spirits high. And I needed this right after day one was a complete disaster. Look at my post back then that said KEEP GOING. 8 days forward: Turns out, a smile can change everything. The organizers even created a new award 🤠 Good energy multiplies. Every checkpoint gave me so much back, and the post-race party topped it all. La muñeca was a surprise but hey, life’s full of surprises. Thank you to everyone who cheered me on, carried me through this race, and truly wanted to see me succeed-os amo❤️ all the hardships lose their weight when we are good to each other. And finishing the @passoftears in this spirit is the biggest win I could’ve asked for. I haven’t even looked at my ranking yet, because it fades compared to the connections, moments, skills, friendships &love I’ve experienced and gained. Love always wins. And knows no losers. I am so thankful for the hardships, the doubts and desperation I had to face during the 8 days of racing ( I made it to the finish line 2 days faster than expected) – because every day was a proof that I could find my way through it all. Sometimes with a detour, sometimes with a shortcut. I always found a way. And this is so reliefing and confidence-boosting. You never really know what life will throw at you – but now I know I will always find a way. Keep your spirits high. God will handle the rest.