Screw It Just DO It with Alex Chisnall

For eight years, four-time Winter Olympian Chemmy Alcott deliberately competed at 80% of her potential. Not because she lacked talent, but because she feared giving everything and discovering her best wasn't good enough.

In this Founder Classic episode of Screw It Just DO It, I sit down with Chemmy to explore how fear of failure and perfectionism held her back until an unexpected second chance at a World Cup race changed everything.

We discuss the breakthrough performance that came when she stopped playing safe, the lessons she learned from serious injuries, and how she rebuilt her identity beyond professional skiing.

From overcoming setbacks and embracing failure to challenging your limits and finding the courage to start again, Chemmy shares why sometimes the biggest obstacle to success is our own fear of trying.

Key takeaways:

◼️ Fear of failure can hold back even the most talented people. Chemmy admits she deliberately competed at 80% for eight years because she feared discovering her best wasn't enough.

◼️ Perfectionism can prevent progress. Her breakthrough came when she stopped trying to control every aspect of her performance.

◼️ Second chances can change everything. After finishing 31st in a World Cup race, another competitor's disqualification gave Chemmy an unexpected opportunity to race again.

◼️ Your best performance doesn't have to be perfect. Chemmy describes her historic run as perfect precisely because it was imperfect.

◼️ Setbacks can teach lessons that success cannot. Serious injuries challenged Chemmy physically and mentally, shaping her approach to resilience.

◼️ Let others see you fail. Chemmy learned to skateboard at 40 so her children could see her struggle, practise and improve.

◼️ Your identity can evolve. Leaving professional skiing meant redefining herself and discovering new goals beyond elite sport.

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.

🎟️ Ready to take your next big step? Join us at the Festival of Entrepreneurs on 2027. Connect with ambitious founders, learn from successful entrepreneurs and discover new opportunities to grow your business.

👉 Find out more: ⁠https://www.festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk/⁠

Simon Gray spent 21 years building Boost Drinks into a major challenger brand before selling the business to AG Barr. But instead of retiring, he decided to start again in his fifties.

In this episode of Screw It Just DO It, Alex Chisnall sits down with Simon to explore how he launched Boost with a £30,000 bank loan, took calculated risks and built a successful drinks business from the ground up.

Simon also reveals the emotional reality of selling Boost, including breaking down in tears before announcing the deal to his team, and why he chose to launch another venture, Fizz With Purpose, the company behind It's Giving.

From building a challenger brand and navigating a business exit to rediscovering purpose and starting again, Simon shares the lessons he's learned about entrepreneurship, leadership, resilience and knowing when to take the leap.

Key takeaways

• You don't have to be first to succeed. Simon spotted an opportunity in an established drinks market and built Boost into a challenger brand.

• Calculated risks can create opportunities. He launched Boost with a £30,000 bank loan while initially managing two businesses.

• Knowing when to commit matters. Simon waited for signs of momentum before focusing entirely on Boost.

• Selling a business is deeply personal. After 21 years, the emotional weight of the sale and its impact on employees brought Simon to tears.

• Success can change your identity. Simon discusses the uncertainty of leaving behind a business that had defined much of his professional life.

• It's never too late to start again. Rather than retire, Simon launched Fizz With Purpose in his fifties.

• Building a business requires the right people. Simon explains why leadership, a clear vision and a trusted team are essential for growth."

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.

🎟️ Ready to take your next big step? Join us at the Festival of Entrepreneurs on 3–4 November at the NEC Birmingham. Connect with ambitious founders, learn from successful entrepreneurs and discover new opportunities to grow your business.

👉 Find out more: https://www.festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk/

🎧 This episode is powered by WorldFirst, helping ambitious businesses make international payments, pay overseas suppliers and collect payments from around the world.

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What happens when the one thing that defines you is suddenly taken away?

For Richie Norton, rugby was everything. But serious injuries ended his dreams of a professional career, leaving him struggling with his identity and escaping into the Ibiza party lifestyle.

In this Founder Classic episode of Screw It Just DO It, Alex Chisnall sits down with Richie to explore how he rebuilt his life through surfing, yoga, movement and a life-changing move to Australia.

From overcoming injuries and rediscovering his purpose to taking ownership of his future, Richie shares why personal transformation starts with a decision and the courage to take the first step.

A powerful conversation about resilience, reinvention, mental wellbeing and finding your way forward when life doesn't go to plan.

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.

🎟️ Ready to take your next big step? Join us at the Festival of Entrepreneurs on 3–4 November at the NEC Birmingham. Connect with ambitious founders, learn from successful entrepreneurs and discover new opportunities to grow your business.

👉 Find out more: ⁠https://www.festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk/⁠

Yulia Rorstrom spent two years securing one of Duck & Dry's biggest opportunities: a partnership with Primark, a 3,000 sq ft salon in Birmingham and national media attention.

Three months after opening, she knew it wasn't working. So she walked away.

In this episode of Screw It Just DO It, I sit down with Yulia to discuss building Duck & Dry from scratch despite having no experience in the hair industry, discovering she was pregnant while launching her first salon, surviving Covid and making difficult decisions as a founder.

We explore why she chose to close the Primark salon despite years of investment, how Duck & Dry went on to secure opportunities with Rosewood, Battersea Power Station, Harvey Nichols and John Lewis, and why her approach became “Go big or go home.”

It's a conversation about resilience, risk, knowing when to persevere and recognising when it's time to change direction.

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.

🎟️ Ready to take your next big step? Join us at the Festival of Entrepreneurs on 3–4 November at the NEC Birmingham. Connect with ambitious founders, learn from successful entrepreneurs and discover new opportunities to grow your business.

👉 Find out more: https://www.festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk/

🎧 This episode is powered by WorldFirst, helping ambitious businesses make international payments, pay overseas suppliers and collect payments from around the world.

🌍 Doing business internationally? Create your free WorldFirst account at: https://www.worldfirst.com

Everyone told him not to do it. He did it anyway.

After 28 years building Ink, Simon Leslie found himself at a crossroads.

Having steered the business through COVID, he realised something had changed. The passion that had driven him for nearly three decades was no longer there.

He didn't have a detailed plan for what came next.

But he did have a boyhood dream.

He wanted to buy a football club.

So he started telling people. Making connections. Putting his ambition out into the world.

Eventually, that journey led him to Eastbourne Borough Football Club.

The response from almost everyone around him?

Don't do it.

They told him it would be a waste of money, time and energy.

But Simon wanted to create something special. Something that could leave a legacy.

In this Founder Classic episode of Screw It Just DO It, Simon joins Alex Chisnall to discuss what happens when you walk away from the business that has defined you, trust your instincts and pursue a dream that others don't understand.

In this conversation:

● Why Simon walked away after 28 years building Ink

● Recognising when you've lost your passion

● How telling people about his dream opened unexpected doors

● Why everyone advised against buying Eastbourne Borough

● Creating a legacy through football and community

● Separating your identity from your business

● Staying committed when things don't go to plan

● The importance of being present and letting go of unnecessary worries

Sometimes the biggest risk isn't taking the leap.

It's spending the rest of your life wondering what might have happened if you had.

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.

🎟️ Ready to take your next big step? Join us at the Festival of Entrepreneurs on 3–4 November at the NEC Birmingham. Connect with ambitious founders, learn from successful entrepreneurs and discover new opportunities to grow your business.

👉 Find out more: https://www.festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk/

What does it take to turn a university side hustle into a multi-million-pound sports brand used by Olympic champions?

Chris Rea started out selling onesies from his student bedroom. Fourteen years later, he and his co-founder Tom have built Y1 into an international hockey brand, with athletes competing at the highest levels of the sport.

But the journey was far from straightforward.

After appearing on Dragons' Den and receiving an offer, Chris knew it was time to take his business seriously. Yet rapid early growth eventually gave way to challenges, burnout and a difficult decision to step back into employment.

That apparent setback became one of the most valuable experiences of his entrepreneurial career.

In this episode of Screw It Just DO It, Chris shares how he rediscovered his direction, learned from ambitious founders, raised investment from his own community and transformed a broad fashion business into a specialist sports brand.

We explore the importance of knowing when to pivot, why being exceptional in a niche can beat trying to appeal to everyone, and how Y1 went from testing hockey sticks with international players to celebrating Olympic gold medals.

In this episode:

● The Dragons' Den moment that changed everything

● Building a business while studying at university

● Burnout, setbacks and returning to employment

● Why specialising in hockey transformed Y1

● Raising investment from customers and supporters

● Building a sports brand trusted by Olympic athletes

● Expanding into padel and international markets

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🎧 This episode is powered by WorldFirst, helping ambitious businesses make international payments, pay overseas suppliers and collect payments from around the world.

🌍 Doing business internationally? Create your free WorldFirst account at: https://www.worldfirst.com

Charles Black had an idea as a teenager that seemed almost impossible.

He wanted to put cameras in space and broadcast live views of Earth for everyone to see.

The problem? It was around 1990. There was no consumer internet, no streaming technology, broadcasting required government licences, and launching satellites was prohibitively expensive.

Everything was against him.

But Charles never let go of the idea.

In this Founder Classic episode of Screw It Just DO It, I revisit my conversation with Charles Black about the extraordinary journey from a teenage dream in Yorkshire to eventually getting cameras into space.

Charles shares why he remained committed to an idea that was decades ahead of its time, how a chance encounter with a four-leaf clover reinforced his belief that he was on the right path, and why he chose to build other businesses while waiting for the opportunity to pursue his original vision.

Along the way, he qualified as a barrister, decided against practising law and launched an internet company from his bedroom.

He even sold his first website before he knew how to build one.

That business eventually became part of a company acquired for around £90 million.

But the dream of putting cameras in space never disappeared.

We discuss how Charles found his way into the space industry, secured an opportunity involving a Russian spacecraft company, and eventually received his first images from space, including a beautiful photograph of Italy.

For Charles, it was the realisation of an idea he had carried with him for decades.

What stayed with me most from this conversation was his willingness to keep moving forward, even when the path was unclear.

Charles also shares his thoughts on resilience, challenging convention, building something from nothing and why ambitious ideas often demand years of persistence.

His advice to anyone sitting on an idea and waiting for the perfect moment?

“Do it. Go for it.”

If you've been putting off starting a business, questioning whether your idea is possible or wondering whether you've missed your opportunity, this conversation is worth hearing.

Sometimes the idea is right. The world simply needs time to catch up.

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders, entrepreneurs and people who turned ambitious ideas into reality.

Watch on YouTube or listen wherever you get your podcasts, and discover the decisions, challenges and turning points behind their journeys.

🎟️ Ready to turn your own big idea into action?

Join us at the Festival of Entrepreneurs, 3–4 November at NEC Birmingham, for two days of founder stories, practical business insights and opportunities to connect with entrepreneurs who are building and scaling businesses.

👉 www.festivalofentrepreneurs.co.uk

Jonny Plein left a comfortable corporate career in his mid-twenties and went from earning around £50,000 to £60,000 a year to paying himself £500 a month to build his first startup.

That business, Pouch, went on Dragon's Den, received offers from all five Dragons and was eventually acquired.

But just months before the sale, everything nearly disappeared.

A £1 million corporate deal collapsed on the day it was supposed to be signed. Jonny and his co-founders had to cut half the team, money was running out and he gave himself six months to either change the trajectory of the company or walk away.

He kept going.

In this episode of Screw It Just DO It, Jonny shares what happened next, why he believes founders are often “three feet from gold”, why starting his second company was psychologically harder than the first, taking a 70% pay cut to go again and what happened when £1 million of funding commitments disappeared in a single day.

We also talk about Dragon's Den, learning to make your own luck, getting comfortable with failure, knowing when to quit, building resilience and why the downside often becomes less frightening once you actually confront it.

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🎧 This episode is powered by WorldFirst, helping ambitious businesses make international payments, pay overseas suppliers and collect payments from around the world.

Jonny and Yaso are themselves a WorldFirst client, making this a particularly relevant conversation about helping Western brands build and scale their businesses in China.

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Sabrina Stocker realised she wasn't afraid of hard work. She was simply working hard at the wrong thing.

After losing her tennis-events business during lockdown, Sabrina found herself running a new PR company from her local coffee shop.

Then she realised: if she could work from there, she could work from anywhere.

Within a month she'd sold her car, given up her flat, sold everything and moved to Egypt.

In this Founder Classic, Sabrina shares the mindset behind that decision, why staying where she was felt scarier than leaving, and her approach to creating financial, location and time freedom.

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and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.

🎟️ Festival of Entrepreneurs | 3-4 November | NEC Birmingham

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Kim Antoniou has built businesses, lost a fortune, started again and spent years developing technology that didn't exist when she first had the idea.

In this episode of Screw It Just DO It, Kim shares the story behind Auris Tech and Fonetti, the reading platform using voice technology to help children develop their reading confidence and skills.

We talk about losing a business, starting again when she thought she was finished with entrepreneurship, building technology from scratch, failing publicly, ignoring advice, finding purpose around the age of 50 and why sometimes you simply have to keep going when everyone else thinks you should stop.

Kim also explains why she believes improving literacy can change a child's life, and why purpose still has to work commercially if you want to create impact at scale.

If you're building something difficult, starting again after failure or still wondering whether it's too late to find the thing you're meant to do, this conversation is for you.

Subscribe to Screw It Just DO It for more conversations with founders and entrepreneurs who stopped waiting and took action.