The outdoor sports training market these days looks a bit like an old internet forum. Someone recommends something, someone knows a "good guy from Bielsko," someone else has their number saved in their phone for five years. If you're lucky, you'll find a great instructor. If not, you'll spend half the day calling outdated numbers or trawling through Facebook.
And that's where Rideaway comes in, a new project created by two friends from Krosno that tries to bring order to one of the most chaotic segments of outdoor sports: the instructor market.
Can technology finally make the best coaches visible?
The creators of Rideaway say yes.
The Rideaway started on the lift and on the trails
Daniel Mansz and Łukasz Zajdel are behind the project. Mansz is responsible for design and communications, while Zajdel is the CTO and oversees the entire technological side.
But that's only half the story.
Both are active riders. In winter, they spend most of their time skiing and snowboarding, and in summer, they switch to enduro bikes. Their natural habitats are the trails in Wisła, Bielsko-Biała, and Krynica.
The idea for Rideaway wasn't born in PowerPoint or during a strategy session in a coworking space.
It was born during a trip when, despite visiting popular centers, they couldn't find an instructor to help them develop their skills. The problem was recurring: great trainers exist, but they're practically invisible online.
Over the past year, the project's creators have spoken with dozens of instructors in bike parks and on the slopes. Almost all of them said the same thing: They're great teachers, but they don't have time for marketing, and its costs often outweigh the profits from the lessons.
As a result, a huge group of "hidden teachers" has emerged, people with vast knowledge who simply do not have a digital business card.
Rideaway aims to change that.
A platform to help instructors emerge from digital invisibility
Rideaway doesn't target a single age group or skill level. It's an ecosystem where young talent turns two hours of pump track passion into a free pass, a quiet champion with twenty years of experience finally gains visibility without being an influencer, and an advanced rider finds a mentor who can guide them through lines unavailable at any standard riding school.
Rideaway aims to be a platform that connects outdoor sports instructors with people looking for training without having to dig through forums, Facebook or local classifieds.
One of Rideaway's key ideas is discovering instructors across borders. In practice, this means you can find a Polish-speaking MTB instructor in Austria, Italy, or Switzerland, for example, using a single filter: language, location, and date.
Example: You're heading to Leogang for the weekend. You want to ride the most challenging trail with someone who knows it by heart. You enter the location, date, and language, and Rideaway shows you available instructors.
Today, to achieve this, you have to scour Facebook cycling groups, ask around on forums, or hope someone you know knows someone. And yet, somewhere out there, there's an instructor with a free schedule who speaks Polish, but you just can't find him.
For people cycling abroad, this is a real problem. And for instructors, it's a huge missed opportunity.
Rideaway also aims to help discover local talent.
Many bike parks and ski resorts have instructors who have been providing excellent training for years but have never built an online presence. The platform aims to enable them to create a professional profile without having to invest in marketing.
One profile, many sports
Another distinctive feature of the project is its multi-season nature. Instructors don't need to create separate accounts for different disciplines. A single profile can encompass ski lessons in winter and cycling training in summer.
This is important because many coaches operate under this seasonal rhythm. In winter, they work at ski resorts, in summer at bike parks or at cycling camps.
Rideaway is designed to allow them to maintain contact with customers year-round, without having to build marketing from scratch each season.
It's not just convenience. It builds loyalty: a student who likes a cycling instructor returns to them for skiing in the winter.
Adaptive sport as one of the pillars of the project
One of the more interesting tenets of Rideaway is its strong emphasis on adaptive sports.
From the outset, the platform will have dedicated filters for disciplines such as mono-ski, sit-ski, and handbike, which will make it easier to find instructors with appropriate certificates and experience in working with people with disabilities.
This is a market segment that is developing dynamically in many countries, but access to qualified staff can still be difficult.
Less logistics, more driving
Instructors are already participating in platform testing, helping the developers refine the system. Among them are Marcin "Wilku" Wilczkiewicz and Paweł "Kostuch" Paluch.
For instructors, the key is to relieve them of the organizational burden. Rideaway will automate bookings and payment processing, and the instructor will only receive payment for the lesson after it has been confirmed.
For customers, this means something equally important: transparency. Instead of searching for phone numbers in unfamiliar resorts, users receive a simple booking system, reviews from other customers, and confirmation of their dates.
Business model: instructor earns, platform earns
Rideaway wants to be for sports instructors what Booking.com is for accommodation: a simple system where you can find, compare and book.
Just enter your sport, location, and date, and you'll get a list of available instructors with prices, reviews, and online booking options. No more digging through Facebook groups.
Rideaway doesn't want to compete with sports schools. The project's creators say it's more about filling the gap between large schools and the utter chaos of social media announcements.
The business model is commission-based. Instructors don't pay a subscription fee or membership fee. Rideaway only earns money when lessons are booked.
This solution is designed to be safe for both parties: the trainer does not incur costs if there are no clients, and the platform has an incentive to actually deliver users.
The project is only halfway there
For now, Rideaway is in the MVP stage – the first version of the product.
According to the developers, about 50% of the functionality is already ready, and the first clickable version of a selected section of the platform should appear in the next few weeks.
This is the point at which the project starts looking for testers.
Gravity riding instructors – enduro, downhill and freeride – are particularly welcome, as are ski and snowboard coaches and adaptive sports specialists.
In subsequent stages, Rideaway will expand its offer to include other disciplines: swimming, fitness, strength training and kitesurfing.
Co dalej?
The sports instructor market is vast, yet incredibly fragmented. In many places, it still operates on a "referral-a-friend" model.
Rideaway tries to bring some order to this world without taking away from its local character.
Will it succeed? The coming months will tell.
One thing is certain: if the platform really makes finding a good instructor as easy as finding accommodation on Booking.com, it could turn out that many great instructors will become truly visible for the first time.
Rideaway Information
Website: rideaway.app
Have any questions? Daniel will be happy to answer them:
ppgad@pucrs.br
instagram.com/danielmansz
The project is currently looking for instructors to test the platform, and those who sign up for the waiting list are getting six months of the top-tier Pro+ plan for free, with the lowest commission. This is a great opportunity to test their solution without any worries.
Text: Grzegorz Radziwonowski