Martin thanks for giving us your time. So first off, wow! What an announcement. We don’t want to rake over past here, what’s done is done, but how did this all come about?

You know, it was a combination of a lot of factors that all seemed to come together at the right time. Straight after Aaron’s chainless win in Leogang I simply sent him an email entitled “It Has To Be Said”, as I was blown away by that run. Not as a former team manager of his, but as a fan of the sport. That was the ride of a real champion, such composure in adversity, such skill. We had not spoken or emailed since he left Trek World Racing (TWR) and honestly, that was getting old. Turns out we’d both wanted to reach out over the years but neither knew when to make the first step. That run sealed it. So his reply to me was extremely generous and we both agreed to meet up in Mont-Sainte-Anne to return to the friendship we had prior to 2013.

His time with me on TWR was an amazing period for both of us and we had an extremely solid professional relationship, and it was great to be able to meet and catch up on life. As the weeks went by after MSA we were chatting more, and he came to me with the idea of putting together a new program. We spoke in Andorra on the eve of his meeting with YT and covered a lot of ground. All of this happened at a time when Trek clearly wanted to move in another direction.

You ran the highly successful Trek World Racing Team for many years, but that then came to an end. So how did the timing work with all of this? From what Aaron has been saying it all seems to have come about very quickly?

Over a period of time I had seen the desire from Trek’s point of view to brand all their race teams, Road, XC, Enduro etc., the same… same colour bikes, same themed kit, and same name, “Trek Factory Racing”. As a non-factory team owner, I was pushing back on some of these changes as I felt DH had its own audience and TWR was catering well for them. In the end, they decided to move on, and we were both extremely fine with that. It was a very amicable end to an amazing seven years. The results tally is impressive, and the impact the Trek Session and brand has had in DH in that time is not insignificant, so we’re all proud of that.

So pretty much in mid-October Aaron started laying out his vision for a new team, and it really appealed to me. He is super competitive of that there is no doubt, but he wanted to have more fun at the races, surround himself with the right people, and enjoy the whole experience. Anyone who really knows him knows how funny and personable he can be, so I felt privileged that he had the faith in me and my experience to get me onboard with this project.

If the Gwin/YT deal didn’t come off did you have other plans?

Owning and operating race teams is one part of my company 23 Degrees, so had there been no new team project, I would have shifted focus onto the other aspects of the business, while investigating options to go racing again in 2017. In fact for a month after the Worlds that was pretty much what I had started to do.

Has this caused any problems with other sponsors? We notice that Aaron is running SRAM gears but is not officially sponsored by them.

Honestly, not at all. From mid-October through to mid-December Aaron did a huge amount of product testing… the most I have ever witnessed in any of my programs; a whole range of brands, in a whole range of categories. Aaron knows that the team needs to be competitive from race 1 so nothing was done for money alone; it had to be tested and needed to work on the bike in race like conditions. SRAM are still helping the team out but not in a major way as they were already full committed to other contracts when we surfaced with this project.

And there are some ‘interesting choices’. HT were pretty much unheard of until Aaron helped champion them. Do you think it will be the same with brands like TRP and Onza, two brands that are not usually seen on the World Cup circuit?

TRP brakes are new to top level MTB race teams but have had great success in Cyclo-cross and Aaron tested them thoroughly, and is super happy. We also feel that working with the non-orthodox approach of sponsor combinations gives other brands a shot. I’ve always enjoyed that aspect of the teams I’ve run. Working with relatively new brands and watching them grow.

Lifting the profile of Orange and Trek in World Cup DH racing, and working with Honda and YT as virgins to World Cup racing, is exciting stuff. Same with brands like Alpinestars who entered the sport in 2004 with our Honda team, and SDG as well. Tyres are always key, and in my last team we brought Bontrager on as a brand to be a World Cup winner. We have a long term development contract with Onza which allows Aaron to design tyres to his liking, and they’ve already made some great steps forward.

Everyone involved must be pleased that this is a three year deal. Are all sponsors tied in for three years?

For the most part yes, and you need that when you build a team from scratch. Having that level of commitment and certainty allows you to focus on the future without too much concern about having to re-negotiate things annually. We’ve also had some very solid interest from non-industry sponsors which we plan to bring in for 2017 but the timing just didn’t work for 2016. That will allow the team to expand to three riders ideally.

So Angel Suarez, not many people will have heard of him. You are well known within the industry at being able to find young talent and help them achieve their goals. Is this the situation Angel?

My good friend David Vazquez (ex-World Cup racer and now at the UCI) gave me the heads up about Angel in Méribel 2014. That was his first W/Cup race. I walked the course a couple of times to check him out in practice. I was impressed with what I saw and you could see the motorcross background (he’s pretty well known in Spain for his past sport). He managed to qualify for a full season in 2015 and after his 16th in Lenzerheide with very little support I decided to offer him a management deal. As the owner of a Spanish company it’s always a good feeling when you can find a Spanish rider to work with. When it came to selecting a second rider for The YT Mob, Aaron and I had discussed quite a lot of names. We put together a short list of around 15 riders, and that got narrowed down to around four. In the end, Aaron was super keen to mentor a rider. They have a similar background and both come from super supportive families and knowing them both, I knew they would click. Angel is the ‘YT’ in the team, and Aaron is excited about helping Angel reach his goals this season.

So there you have it, another chapter in both Aaron Gwin and Martin Whiteley’s careers. We are looking forward to watching the next three years unfold… exciting times.