No one does grit, determination and mountain biking heart like Matthew Fairbrother. From a Kiwi kid riding through the hills of Christchurch to bikepacking across Europe from one Enduro World Series event to the next at just 17 years old, Matt’s clocked more miles on two wheels than most people will in a lifetime. His motto? If you think about it twice, you’ve gotta do it. His method? Always the same. Just keep going.
Matt’s latest mission landed him in the mountain biking mecca that is the Sea to Sky, British Columbia. A place that has shaped him, inspired him, and challenged him even from half a world away. This time, the goal was one big enough to honour the place, people and culture that had shaped his place in the mountain biking community. Twenty-two hours. Four mountains. One line. One enormous community behind him.
We were stoked to help Matt bring this project to life with ‘Threads in the Dirt’, a film documenting his journey through the Sea to Sky.
Matthew Fairbrother: The Inside Word
“I had my first taste of the Sea to Sky corridor in 2022. Back then, everything felt big and blurry. It was my first season racing Enduro World Cups, and I was barely holding the whole thing together. Travelling on a shoestring, bikepacking between races, scraping by on whatever support I could gather. When Whistler appeared on the calendar, getting there felt impossible. It wasn’t a place I had the luxury of dreaming about; it was a finish line that felt out of reach.
Somehow, through fundraising, long days, and a whole lot of hoping, I made it. But before I’d even landed in Canada, something strange happened. The community started reaching out. People I’d never met before started sharing my story. Encouraging me. Pushing me forward. And by the time I stepped foot in Whistler, it didn’t feel like I was landing somewhere foreign - it felt like I was being welcomed into a community that already believed in me. That kind of support leaves a mark. It gave me confidence in a season where confidence was razor thin.
Once I started riding, everything clicked for me. It felt like the Sea to Sky was a place I’d known long before I ever got there. Growing up in New Zealand, all the media I consumed - the films, the edits, the racing - was centred around this region. The slabs, the steeps, the loam, the culture. It felt mythical, like the sport’s own North Star. I’d always known I wanted to be part of that world one day, I just didn’t know if or when it would happen. When I finally arrived, the connection was immediate. It felt like stepping into a story I’d been reading my whole life.
I love New Zealand more than anything. It shaped me, raised me, and gave me the pride and grit I carry into every challenge. I’ve never once felt like I needed more than what we have at home. The terrain, the culture, the community - it’s always been enough. But the Sea to Sky is different. Not better or worse, just different. Bigger.
Everything here exists on another scale entirely. The climbs are brutal, the descents are endless, the terrain shifts every few kilometres, and the variety is like nothing I’ve ever seen. In New Zealand, we’re spoiled. Here, you’re challenged. Forced to rise to the level of the land, and everyone around you rises with you. That’s the part that hooked me most, the collective mentality. There’s an unspoken agreement here: if someone’s pushing their limits, you support them. If someone’s building something special, you show up. If someone’s trying to level up, you encourage it. The Sea to Sky’s progression didn’t happen by accident, it happened because the people here share a vision and they chase it without hesitation.
I’ve ridden in the Sea to Sky twice before this trip, but both times I had such tight commitments that I barely scratched the surface. When you’re racing, filming, or darting between projects, you only ever see small corners of a place: the highlights, the convenience zones, the must-ride spots.
This time, I came wanting more. I wanted the whole picture. I wanted to understand the terrain that built this culture, the mountains that shaped this history, the places that sparked the progression we all benefit from today.
And with that came the idea. What if I linked it all together?
Instead of sampling one region at a time, I could stitch the corridor into a single thread of riding: Pemberton’s high alpine, Whistler’s raw tech, Squamish’s granite, and the North Shore’s sacred skinnies. One huge line. One long day. One challenge big enough to honour the place that influenced me from across the world.
It wasn’t about proving anything. It wasn’t about setting a record. It was about leaving my own mark, a thread in the dirt, woven into the same landscape that shaped the riders who shaped me.
I didn’t grow up here, but the Sea to Sky shaped me all the same. It influenced my ideas about what mountain biking could be, how far you could push yourself, and what kind of community could exist around two wheels.
This region represents values that resonate deeply with who I am and who I want to be. The progression that has shaped the sport from its earliest days, constantly raising the ceiling because no one is too afraid to push further. The community that forms the backbone of the Sea to Sky, where people show up for each other, build together, support each other, and genuinely care about elevating the sport. And the relentless, get-it-done mentality that strips away boundaries and replaces them with possibilities.
Being here and contributing to that even in a small way felt natural. Like paying back something I’ve been benefiting from for years, even from a world away.
People often ask if I was scared, overwhelmed, or doubting myself going into the mission. The truth? No, not really. It was just another ride. Just bigger, longer, and more isolated than anything I’d done before. That’s the only way you can think of it - you can’t put it out of reach before you even start.
The risks were obvious: more time on the bike meant more fatigue. More fatigue meant more variables, and in the backcountry, small issues can become real problems, fast. I’d done the preparation. I’d minimised every external variable I could. All that was left was to show up and keep moving forward. Rides like this are simple when you break them down: you just keep going.
There wasn’t a moment when I nearly cracked. That’s not bravado, it’s clarity. When you’re in something this big, you’ve only got one job: keep going. When you focus on that, everything else stays quiet.
The moments that stood out were the descents. Every single one of them. The feeling of topping out a climb, knowing you’ve earned every metre, is hard to compare to anything else. You drop in with gratitude, adrenaline, and the kind of focus you can only get from suffering on the way up. Those moments reminded me exactly why I do this, why I chase these ideas. Why I throw myself into challenges that make no sense to most people, but every bit of sense to me.
Crossing the final point at the end of the North Shore Triple Crown hit me harder than I expected. I don’t often feel proud of myself. It’s not that I’m hard on myself, I just tend to immediately look toward the next thing. But this time? Yeah, there were some feelings. I’d done everything I set out to do. I’d executed well. I’d stayed calm, stayed focused, overcome problems, and never let the size of the mission overshadow the simplicity of the goal.
Finishing elevated everything. My respect for this region, for the riders who shaped it, for the builders, the land, and the culture. It reinforced something I’d felt since the first day I arrived here: the Sea to Sky is an outlier of the best kind.
If someone is reading this ten years from now, I hope you take away one simple message: honour the past, respect what you’ve got, and make the most of what’s in front of you. The Sea to Sky wasn’t built overnight; it came from generations of effort, passion, and people believing in what this place could be. If there’s something you want, go after it. Don’t let yourself, or anyone else, hold you back.
Because at the end of the day, we all leave something behind. Even if it’s just a thread in the dirt. That’s how the legacy stays alive.”
