How did you get into what you do? 

I went to Swansea University to study Mechanical Engineering, graduated with a Mechanical Engineering degree MEng with a Year in Industry, and then got lucky with a part-time job in customer service within The Rider Firm. I had a" gap year" before a job opening appeared within the engineering department.

When I started in the industry, e-bikes were this new thing and just taking off. You'd rarely see one outside of a bike shop. Now, they are everywhere, and it is a big focus, generally. This has caused a significant trickle-down in technology to analogue mountain bikes, which, as it always seems to do, has seen an effect on the rest of the industry. Bikes are now made to higher standards and the components are great. There aren't any bad components anymore. Gravel bikes have also become more popular, and more niches appear within niches. 

But bikes are bikes; they are still fun, and that's why we do it, so things have mostly stayed the same in the grand scheme of things.

What does the average week look like? 

No two weeks are generally the same which is really nice. Some weeks can be intensive on testing wheels, others 3d printing process (making prototypes for wind tunnel trips), some weeks a lot of organisation of testing and some weeks are heavily based around design work, using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD)/Finite Element Analysis (FEA) to help understand how wheels react in certain situations.

If you weren't doing this, where would you be?

Working in what is considered a more traditional engineering firm, likely in the dock yards of Plymouth, as it was a 50/50 split between working there or in The Rider Firm during my year out.

We'll be seeing more of Ollie Mant and the rest of our engineering and product design team in upcoming journal posts, so remember to follow us on social media and sign up for our mailer to be notified of new, behind-the-scenes content.