You can spot him from a mile away: tall, suntanned, with dark blond dreadlocks and a bushy beard, his massive four-wheel-drive truck filled with building equipment and labeled with the license plate "HOTUNA". "I had a hot pink T-shirt with the Hotuna logo on the front that I wore until it was so thin it felt like wearing nothing at all, and it kind of became my trademark," explained Mat Langeliers, course cross-country course builder.

Laid-back and unassuming, Langeliers is not to be underestimated. At only twenty four years of age, he has spent six years helping to construct some of the biggest three-day events in the world: Rolex Kentucky, (USA), Badminton, (GBR), Adelaide, (AUS) and the Olympic course in Sydney, (AUS).

"People would say, 'You're so lucky to get to work on these courses'," he said. "I didn't realize what they meant at first, because I was lucky enough to start out working on the good ones." That's because he started out with eventer Pete Costello, whose brother Mick builds the course at Rolex. Through the Costello brothers he met the Willis brothers, who build the course at Badminton. Things took off from there.