History

Marcel has been involved in cycling for over twenty years. His passion for the sport had its genesis when he rode at a junior level, and over the years progressed to racing internationally in the USA in the mid ‘90s. On his return to Australia in 1999, his interest in cycling took a new direction as he focused his attention of developing his coaching skills. He qualified as a level 2 coach and has been actively coaching all levels of cyclists ever since – from novice through to elite cyclists, competing at the state, national and international level.

As the cycling coach for Intraining Triathlon Squad, Marcel looked after people ranging from those who had never been on a bike to those who competed nationally. During this time, he realised that there was a growing interest in cycling as a sport, but for many people in Brisbane, it was difficult to enter the sport.

With this in mind, in January 2002, Marcel decided to take a slightly different path and began to explore the market for people wanting assistance to get into both road and track cycling. At this time, Marcel had been coaching a group of women triathletes whose focus had changed to racing their bikes as a team. The result was the Marcellettes who made their debut at the Murwillumbah Easter Cycling Carnival. With their signature colour of pink, the Marcellettes initially competed at the State level on both the road and track, with some significant successes including winning a number of State titles and being the multiple Teams Timetrial Champions of Queensland. In 2006, the Marcellettes began competing consistently at the National level in a number of national road series events and in 2007 made a big jump when they competed in the Geelong World Cup tour and World Cup race as well as a majority of National Series Events. With a focus on racing at the elite level, the Marcellettes have come a long way since their early years.

With the Marcellettes came the beginnings of MB Coaching and a number of Marcel’s signature programs – the highly popular beginner’s course and the all-wealther-friendly windtrainer sessions. In the early days, Marcel conducted his windtrainer sessions, with ten trainers, upstairs at Lifecycle, where Marcel was employed at the time.

With the growing popularity of his coaching business over 2002, Marcel developed the business to the point where new premises were needed. A studio on Petrie Terrace became the first MB Coaching premises. The new home for MB Coaching had enough space to fit over 30 windtrainers, provided a focal point organised rides and had scope to develop other aspects of Marcel’s business, such as profession bike fitting and lactate testing.

Over the coming years, MB Coaching continued to grow. Monthly programs were developed for beginner, intermediate and advanced levels of riders which offered a combination of long road rides on the weekend, road sessions during the week and a windtrainer/ergo session. MB Coaching riders became common competitors at all levels of racing at State events, both on the road and the track. A trip down to the “Tour Down Under” became a yearly event, with up to 50 clients going to Adelaide to watch the professional’s race, get in lots of great riding in the Adelaide Hills, and enjoy some of the features of the regions, particularly the South Australian wine.

With a multi-dimensional business, MB Coaching out grew its Petrie Tce premises and a new home was found for the business in 2006, at 23 Lang Pde, Auchenflower where MB Coaching extended into MB Cycles, the pro bike shop of Brisbane - a bike shop built around the reputation of Marcel’s coaching business.

Marcel has come a long way in the past few years and his vision for the future means we can be certain that the MB Coaching will continue to unfold for years to come.