Al Gosling, developed a passion for extreme sports during his early teens and following a number of jobs went on to set up a business that would rapidly grow into the The Extreme Sports Company . School work was never a big focus for Al and being partially dyslexic he never achieved anything of note, but very early on he became an entrepreneur, starting various business ventures which included managing two bands and selling board shorts and surf wear from the back of his Renault 5, whilst studying for exams.

Following a two-year spell in the Bahamas working for a marine research company as their pilot, dive master and yacht captain, Al returned to the UK in 1995. Aged 24 and unable to find a job that interested him, he set up Extreme with the goal of mixing sports and business, working with great people and having fun while making it happen. Running on a shoestring budget, from an office in a converted barn more akin toa mountain hut or surf-shack than the headquarters of a fast growing media business, Al and the team rapidly agreed a number of deals with producers and broadcasters to sell and distribute extreme and action sports television programmes all over the world. In April 1998, Al had the vision to create and launch the world's first TV channel dedicated to extreme sports, The Extreme Sports Channel. The goal was to launch a 24/7 TV channel broadcasting these sports worldwide via satellite to an under-served audience. And the rest as they say is history.

Since then Al and the team have taken the Brand and developed it into drinks, shops, mobile phones, theme parks and clothing. This year the group employs 247 people and is on target to reach $45m turnover.

Today Al is completely passionate about The The Extreme Sports Company , Extreme sports, helping promote Entrepreneurship to the next generation and when not in the office or in meetings you will find him either windsurfing, kite surfing, flying, off-piste skiing, ice climbing or sailing somewhere in the world.

Al met Jamie Murry Wells the 25 year old founder of Glassesdirect when judging a entrepreneurs competition which Jamie won and then came on board as a Non executive director and seed investor. Al then worked helping and advising Jamie across all areas and driving the company forward. It has been a great journey, with Al and Jamie becoming firm friends along the way and Glassesdirect becoming incredibly successful. For more information please visit Glassesdirect here.

Al met Robby Sur the 26 year old MD and founder of the UK’s leading online urban fashion retailer Yukka.co.uk and was immediately impressed by Robby approach and the fact he had grown Yukka.co.uk to a £1m plus company withy no outside help at all. Al has recently joined as Non Executive Chairman and taken an equity stake in Yukka with a view to driving the biz and building a group of online retailers all using the same infrastructure and resources but leaving the founders firmly in place running and driving the businesses. For more info please click here.

Al is a share holder and a non-executive director at Diffusion Media Group,visit the website here.

If you like what you see and want Al to come to one of your events send him an email at: getintouch@Extremeinternational.com