Date of birth - 03/01/96

Hometown - Chalford Hill, near Stroud, near Bugs, Gloucestershire, England!

Current setup- All the latest, cutting edge MBS gear - Dylan III deck, Matrix III trucks, F5 bindings, rockstar pro II hubs (white), T1 tyres.

Stance – regular aka forwards

Sponsors - MBS, Bugsboarding, Daydream Productions, Orbury Common.

What is your riding style - Jibby, creative, freestyle, cruisey, loose, injured.

Favourite place to ride - Bugsboarding!! But other than that I enjoy skateparks and good flowy bike jumps.

Favourite music - here’s my top songs of 2021 - https://open.spotify.com/playlist/37i9dQZF1EUMDoJuT8yJsl?si=159207dfa04e48ae 2022 will probably be pretty different!

Favourite Mountainboard video - Like This by the BFC, as I was given it after my first day at Bugsboarding, and it really showed me what mountainboarding was all about. Then in later years Giving Birth to Rad Mag by Tom Kirkman and co. was the one!

Favourite food - anything vegan!

Favourite beverage - lager’s pretty nice actually

How did you get into the Mountainboarding - I thought mountainboards looked sick when I was about 10, and was very envious of a few of my friends that had them, but it was a trip to Bugsboarding for a friend’s birthday that got me really hooked. I found a £20 Mindless board on Gumtree and got all my friends in the village to come bomb a local hill with an Argos kicker every single day of the summer holidays between primary school and secondary. The next year the regular trips to Bugs began and the rest is history.

Why do you Mountainboard - Firstly the sensation of it is incredible, whether riding down a grass hill or a dirt track, or boosting a jump, sending a smooth 360 or a cheeky boardslide, or jibbing and flowing in a skatepark; it just feels super satisfying and I guess it provides just the right amount of adrenaline. I also love the uniqueness and creativity of mountainboarding - it’s usually possible to try something completely new, either for you or for the sport as a whole; when you combine this with filming and editing it becomes a really fun creative process. Lastly the community is amazing, there are so many like-minded and friendly people that mountainboard, and there’s always such a welcoming and exciting atmosphere at a session, competition or party.

How do you stay motivated – All the above reasons motivate me to keep mountainboarding for as long and as regularly as I can, but filming is one of the main things that’ll make me head out the door with my mountainboard, often for a solo session. I’ve always been into making riding edits, as a way to continue the session even when it’s over, and to be able to connect and, to be honest, show off my riding to the wider community. Recently, Instagram Reels have been a great motivator in getting me out to quickly film a new learn or at a new spot. Likewise, seeing more and more content of other people doing the same thing has got me stoked, as has listening to The Dirt podcast: hearing people’s mountainboard stories has re-ignited a lot of peoples passion for the sport, and each episode makes me want to get out on my board.

Where have you travelled to Mountainboard – so far, all over England and Wales, and over the channel to France (the Alps, LA Park, Compeigne), Belgium (Wanyi!), Switzerland (Skills Park!), and Slovenia (Kranj!!). I’d like to see more of what Scotland and Ireland have to offer; I definitely plan to check out Dawid’s park in Poland, and the Sintra spot in Portugal; and I’d to love to venture to the US, Australia and even Japan if funds allowed it one day!

How do you get others involved in Mountainboarding - I used to teach at Bugs, and I’d like to do more of that soon, but right now I just try to ride and film as much as possible. I hope that when I’m at Bugs, skateparks, pumptracks etc., my riding looks fun and motivates others. I always try to expain mountainboarding is, where to get one and where to do it when I’m riding at public spots. Trying to increase awareness and interest of the sport is also a big motivation for posting videos on Instagram and TikTok, and trying to get them out to as many people as possible. People will often comment expressing their desire to start riding, and you never know which little Tik Tok kid could be the next Matt Brind!

What do you think the future of Mountainboarding holds - The sport has seen a big dip in numbers in the last 10 years, but something’s changed post-lockdown - more and more people are coming back to the sport and others are picking it up for the first time and quickly getting obsessed. I think it’s going at a nice steady rate uphill at the moment: I’m finding more oppurtunities to ride with others, and it makes me feel more secure about the future of mountainboarding, because for a while I thought there might only be a handful of us desperately trying to carry on in the UK. The boards themselves continue to improve, as do a lot of people’s tricks and style, which I think can only help get more and more young people on a board. It’s tough these days with the amount of other distractions, and the 5 second attention spans that a lot of us have, but the young kids at Bugs like who are starting to get really into it, and progress really fast (Lewis Sams, for example!), are showing the rest that rolling down a hill is still the best. I don’t know if mountainboarding will ever be as big as the other action sports like snowboarding, biking and skateboarding, but that’s part of the reason it feels so original and creative, and why the community has such a family feel.

Who are your 3 favourite Mountainboarders - definitely the hardest question on here, so I’ll have to answer in multiple ways. To ride with - Amon Shaw, Matt Brind and Ben Searle (with honourable mentions to Will Fox, the Daydream crew and the Bristol boys!). Historically the best to watch - Tom Kirkman, Tom Reed and Joe Dickson. People that get me stoked to ride now and are doing amazing bits for the sport - Dylan Warren, AJ Lawson and Dawid Rząca. So I guess my first answers from all 3 categories are Amon Shaw, Tom Kirkman and Dylan Warren haha.

Favourite thing about Mountainboarding - just the feeling of riding, especially when that feeling is shared with good pals on the hill.

What do you do outside of Mountainboarding - I’m a musician in a electronic duo/cult called Orbury Common, you can hear us here and we’ll see you at a gig! - https://open.spotify.com/artist/5mObFLIzPS4XGDTkNVaQrg?si=-6QAj-9JR0WyhRhxiQkU2w I also work in a wood workshop on a farm in Bristol, supporting people with learning disabilities to learn woodwork skills, and to help out with other aspects of farm life. I skateboard a bit too, and get out on as many explorations of the countryside as possible with my partner Polly!