OPINION Mountain Biking is a World-Leading
Industry in Environmental Responsibility - So Why Aren’t We Talking About It?
By Rachel Coleman PHOTO BY RICH BAYBUTT
A
t Trash Free Trails (TFT), mountain biking is part of our soul. Our CEO, Dom, is a lifelong rider, and having returned to his home trails in Wales in 2017 after working for Surfers Against Sewage for almost a decade, he began to notice the
same problem he was tackling in his day job at his favourite riding spots - the presence of single-use pollution, or litter, disrupting his flow and enjoyment of these places, causing untold harm. But where marine litter had captured the cultural moment,
there was a deafening silence about the same issue polluting our trails. Fast forward to 2026, and TFT is a small but mighty team
stewarding a world-leading not-for-profit who advocate for the places we ride, and our incomparable connection to them. At TFT, we’ve never lost our riding roots - our Ambassador
24 | October 2026
A-TEAM volunteers represent riding communities from the Highlands to Italy, Bristol to Morzine, and half the team have not long returned from a mammoth activation at the Les Gets UCI Mountain Bike World Cup. We live, breathe and love riding - in fact, our love of pedalling is so strong that it got me, a total off-road rookie, hooked on mountain biking within my first year with the organisation. I’m still terrified, but my smile’s never so big as when it’s mud-splattered from sending it down a flowy descent.
Since our formal founding in 2019, TFT has enabled over 8,500 volunteers across the world to remove and record almost 700,000 items of trash from the places we ride and adventure in. We work with partners from across the sector to inspire and empower riders to be custodians for their home trails and carry that mentality wherever their bikes take
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