Why Snowboarder Scotty James Bought an X Games Stake

Scotty James has been an Olympian since he was 15.

Throughout the Australian snowboarder’s journey through the sport, his brother Sean has been recording. He amassed roughly 1,000 hours of home video documenting his brother’s rise to the highest level of snowboarding.

Those 1,000 hours are the basis of a Netflix documentary, out Dec. 19, following James’s path to becoming one of the world’s top snowboarders, culminating in his chase for Olympic gold at the 2026 Milano Cortina Games.

Pipe Dream, a new documentary produced by Front Office Sports Studios, captures James’s rise and quest for his first Olympic gold. The snowboarder personally invested in the project—a rarity in the sports content world—that also features Chloe and Lance Stroll, as well as Shaun White.

Australia has nabbed only one gold medal in the past three Winter Olympics. James would’ve earned gold in the halfpipe in Beijing in 2022 if not for the event’s final rider, who knocked him down to silver. He also won bronze in the halfpipe in 2018 in Pyeongchang.

The snowboarder has been more successful at the X Games, where he’s won seven gold medals. He’s also been an adviser and investor in the X Games since 2023, playing a big role in the business of the league. He is the only active athlete with an ownership stake in the X Games.

James, 31, married into sports royalty when he tied the knot in 2023 with Chloe Stroll, whose billionaire father, Lawrence, owns Aston Martin and its Formula One racing team. Chloe’s brother, Lance, is an F1 driver for Aston Martin.

James joined Front Office Sports Today to talk about the documentary, his legacy, and his new business role with the X Games.

Front Office Sports: What made you want to do a documentary?

Scotty James: To be honest, I never ever told my story in depth. And we have so much amazing archive footage, I think we were able to really bring together a cool story about a kid from Australia who’s had to go through some challenging moments and was a snowboarder, which is, who would’ve thought?

FOS: Were there people you specifically enjoyed highlighting or working with on this?

SJ: A lot of my peers and very highly respected people in the industry had their thoughts on my journey, and some of my other competitors, and it was really the first time I’ve actually heard them talk about me specifically, the good and the bad.

FOS: Next year the X Games will have the X Games League, and you’re a part of that, but as an adviser. I’m curious what’s going to be your involvement in the X Games League and what’s maybe different as an adviser than, say, an ambassador or an actual competitor in this?

SJ: I wear a couple of different hats now when it comes to X Games, but most importantly, my main hat is still to, you know, want to try and win the events. And then the other hat is, how can I gather as much information from the athletes literally in that present moment?

Which I think is relatively unique. I feel a lot of other athletes kind of get to the end of their career and then they decide, “Hey, let’s maybe step into the business side and see where we can help the industry,” which I think is amazing. But I saw an opportunity, and it was also timing, where I thought, you know, “I want to invest in this company. I’ve always loved it. It’s got amazing history,” but I do think that myself, I can have some real positive impact from the athlete’s perspective, as well as competing.

So in this case, we’re in Aspen and we need some adjustments in the pipe, I speak directly with my competitors, and it’s an immediate feedback from the mountain to the business.

Watch the rest of the FOS interview with Olympic snowboarder Scotty James below.