Author: Toby Shapshak

Wow. After a charmed 21-year stratospheric run, gravity has finally caught up with Apple’s share price. It has grown steadily since Steve Jobs took over in 1997, and became not only the most valuable listed company in the world, but the first to hit the unprecedented US$1-trillion mark last August. Until last week. In a 1,400-word letter to investors, CEO Tim Cook that Apple was expecting a US$9bn revenue shortfall for its fiscal 2019 first quarter, which ended on December 29. Even though its expecting about $84bn in revenue, with gross margin of around 38%, it’s less than the previously…

The Tour de France is the hardest cycling race in the world – even if it has been sullied by the disgraced Lance Armstrong era of doping – and is the pinnacle of athletic achievement just to compete. High-tech equipment will get you only so far, then natural ability, stamina, teamwork and a passionate intensity to succeed are needed. This year’s favourite, Chris Froome, has all of these – as well as coming second and winning bronze in the time trial at the Olympics last year – and has spent his off-season in South Africa, honing his preparation. The humble,…

A decade ago, Chris Froome was watching Lance Armstrong competing in the Tour de France from his boarding school, St Johns in Johannesburg, and dreamt of doing the same. “I was 17 and I was fixated on it. I was in awe of the ambience of the crowd and the mountains. I had that ‘Wow, I’d love to do that one day’ feeling. That was the pipe dream but I never really – until recently – thought it would come true,” he recently told the Guardian, about the first time he saw the much-maligned, doping scandal-tainted Tour de France. Froome,…