IT IS not the most conventional introduction to a new career - a 3000ft plunge off Angel Falls in the deepest jungles of Venezuela.

But Scottish base jumper Kris Yule's first encounter with Go Fast! founder Troy Widgery on a week-long trip more than a year ago barely raises an eyebrow in a company obsessed by extremes.

The 32-year-old Yule, who was so impressed by the entrepreneur that he raised millions of pounds to launch the Go Fast! energy drink in Scotland last week, joins a long line of adrenaline junkies hoping to make a living out of the American brand.

At Go Fast! headquarters in Denver, Colorado, executives are more likely to have motorcycle racing and snowboarding listed under education and training on their CV than an MBA. Widgery himself, a leather-jacket toting, cowboy boot-wearing former skydive champion, survived a horrific plane crash while training for the US national championships in the early 1990s. Two months after breaking his collar bone, back and hip, he was diving out of a plane again.

"It's probably the most extreme brand out there," boasted Widgery, who flew into Edinburgh last week for the official launch party. "Other companies have tried to connect themselves with extreme sports, but not like us. We've just had one of our sponsored athletes swoop the Christ The Redeemer statue in Brazil in a winged suit. He flew over the statute, clipped the trees and kept going. No-one has clipped trees and lived!"

It is exactly this hard-core attitude that Yule hopes will sell the Go Fast! energy drink to sports enthusiasts and clubbers in Britain. He has given up a job running the sales and marketing department of The Scotsman newspaper to be the UK distributor of Go Fast! The venture, which is based in Balfron, near Stirling, is being financed by undisclosed private investors.

"Go Fast! will be in the top three energy products in the UK," Yule enthused. "We'd like to think that will take five years, but it might take a bit longer."

This will be no easy task. Go Fast Sports & Beverage Co, which has a worldwide turnover of $36 million, is a minnow in a drinks industry populated by giants such as Coca-Cola. In the UK, it will be competing against the likes of Red Bull and Irn-Bru 32 - both of which have vast distribution networks and marketing budgets.

Go Fast! is in just 70 clubs, bars, sports centres and stores. But Yule, an Aussie who moved to Scotland nine-and-half years ago, remains undaunted.

The company is trying to position the caffeinated drink, whose formulation contains vitamins and ingredients including ginseng, ginkgo biloba and honey, at the premium end of the market. It retails at £1.20 for 250ml, slightly more expensive than a can of Red Bull.

Widgery does not see Red Bull as a competitor in the US and claims the taste of Go Fast! appeals to a wider age demographic than the core of 18 to 25-year-old males who regularly consume energy drinks.

Go Fast! is a lifestyle brand, Yule adds, not one built out of mass-market media campaigns. "We're not big spenders in above the line advertising," said Yule. "I'd much prefer putting money into a big event that is going to attract media coverage and the kind of customers that the brand really appeals to, as opposed to sticking a TV advert on ITV and hoping the right people are watching."

In Go Fast! speak, that means pulling off and sponsoring death-defying stunts and events. Last week, the company powered up its jet pack (which Widgery had built several years ago because he'd "always wanted one") and had a stuntman zoom across Tower Bridge in London one day and then hover above Princes Street in Edinburgh the next.

The London stunt earned them a little more attention than they wanted, Yule admits. "The Health and Safety Executive and a jet pack don't really go together. It requires a lot of approvals," he said. "We just went for it. The area just over the mayor's office was private land and, well, they were just a little bit upset with us."

Beyond sponsoring 30 UK athletes, including British touring car prodigy Gordon Shedden, Yule has a number of other events in the works. In Eastbourne, Go Fast! is sponsoring a giant street luge where speedskaters and skate boarders will careen down a hill at breakneck speeds into hay bales. In August, the company is teaming up with a new extreme mountain bike park in the Borders for a competition event.

The Scottish market, says Yule, is the perfect test-bed for the drink before it is more widely distributed across the UK.

"Most of the large sports events are held here. Scotland is the outdoor capital of the UK with mountainbiking, hiking and surfing," he explains. "Once we've got Scotland covered, then we will grow into other areas, starting with Leeds and Manchester."