Britain's Nitro Circus Star Jamie Squibb is Living the Dream

The phrase 'living the dream' is overused and generally bullshit. I know for a fact that I wouldn't want to live in a world where any of my shitty dreams became reality.

But in the case of Jamie Squibb, it's hard not to feel you're looking at someone living out their teenage fantasies. "The first two times Nitro Circus came to the UK, me and my girlfriend bought tickets and just went to watch," he tells me with a huge grin. "I was sat there with a beer and I said to my girlfriend, 'I need to ride in this.' It shows that when you set your goals and targets, you can get there."

We're standing in a quiet corner of the riders' room at London's 02 Arena, where Jamie and some of the world's best freestyle motocross riders (Travis Pastrana is sat next to me nursing a cold beer, no big deal) have just finished their second sold out Nitro Circus show. "It was amazing," says Squibb, "everyone knows Nitro Circus, and to be a part of it and to be out there riding with all of those guys – it's just phenomenal. This is the best experience I've had in my entire riding life. This week has totally blown my mind, both in practice and on the shows. The level of ability of these riders is just amazing."

Unlike most of the other riders on the tour, Squibb didn't grow up in the perfect dirt biking climate of California or Australia. In fact, he hails from the more-often-rainy south-west of England.

"I grew up down in Devon. My family had some woodland, and my dad always had dirt bikes. When I was in nappies I remember being sat on the petrol tank, hanging on to the handlebars while he was ripping around the farm. My dad was also in construction, so by the time I was 12 I was on diggers building jumps in the woods. And it just progressed – I started to get bigger bikes and build bigger ramps."

It certainly did progress; he's now part of the DC Team and spends his time flying around the world, performing at huge shows with some of the best riders in the business, and occasionally appearing on TV ­– here's his somewhat bizarre cameo on Don't Tell The Bride.

"I've just been riding my arse off," he tells me. "In the past couple of years everything just fell into place and I've improved a lot. I started competing in more events in Europe so you begin to get noticed more, then a good friend of mine who knows all of the Nitro Circus guys put in a word from me – the next thing you know, I'm here!"

This journey hasn't all been plain sailing, however, and like most extreme sportsmen he's had his fair share of low points. "Aside from injuries, there were two or three years that were really difficult as there wasn't much work going. I was just about earning enough money to quit my job, and my dad sat me down and said, 'You've got one more year, and if things don't start to work out you've got to move on with your life.' And luckily for me, a bunch of shows fell into place, and it was the old snowball effect – everything just kept on getting better."

As well as touring with a team of world-class riders, he also runs Squibb Freestyle, a live show he's ingeniously built around a lorry that he drives up and down the country. "It's great, because in England – where there's a lot more smaller shows with a lot of different acts in the same arena – we can pull the ramps in and within 10 minutes we can be ready to do an FMX show."

You can tell that Jamie takes a lot of pride in being able to run these shows, but has being involved in an event as huge as Nitro Circus made him want to grow his own idea into something equally big?

"As long as I'm happy and there's food on the table, it's all good! I don't want to be some giant corporation that gets greedy, and then it's all about money and power. I hate that shit. As long as I'm out on my bike having fun, that's all that matters."

A loud whistle sounds around the riders' room as the Nitro Circus tour director walks in and gathers all the performers for a post-show debrief. As it's the last day that Jamie and the other UK riders will be on the tour, a good portion of the speech is about how great they've been. As the director thanks Jamie personally, Travis Pastrana starts a chant of "STAY! STAY! STAY!"

What was that about living the dream?

@nathancopelin