Nasty things, broken collarbones. Painful and severely restricting in what you can do.

Luke Christian and Tim Cottingham have both felt the pain.

Luke suffered his when he came off his mountain bike on Whinlatter. Signed off work for four weeks, he couldn’t rest up.

He thought about learning a language, then he and best friend Tim decided to make a go of turning Tim’s breakfast into a business.

“I didn’t want to be sat on a sofa wasting time, I wanted to achieve something,” he explains.

“We had talked before about the muesli being good enough to sell and we just thought ‘hey, let’s do this’.

“We booked a stall at Keswick market and then we had three days to get ready!”

Based on a recipe they learned from a Swedish friend, the muesli involves a carefully judged mixture of cereals, proteins and good fats.

They bought ingredients and cellophane bags from Amazon, printed off labels on their home computers and toasted the flakes in their parents’ kitchens. The business grew steadily until Christmas time when the pair faced a decision.

Tim explains: “I said I was putting a lot of time into it and that we could either pack it in, Luke could quit his job and work on this, or I would find another partner.

“We vaguely committed to it and put a decision off until September.”

September came and Luke was promoted, but still decided to quit life as a management consultant for Deloitte in London and return home to make a go of the muesli business once and for all.

“I was always going to review working for Deloitte after two years,” he says.

“Everyone down there is envious of me. They are very supportive, but for a lot of people, what I’m doing is their dream.”

The muesli dream currently involves lots of meetings – with business advisors, possible customers and promotional work.

The official launch of Lakeland Mues (they shorten words all the time) was at last month’s Taste Cumbria food festival in Cockermouth and they have barely had time to draw breath since.

They are already supplying hotels and Pioneer foods and have a BBC film crew charting the birth of their business as part of a series to be broadcast in the new year.

We chat in their office.

Take a back road to Wigton and in a converted low outhouse they have one of three converted offices.

It’s in a yard behind the home of Luke’s parents.

At one end of the office is a folded up divan bed and mattress, halfway down is a pallett with sacks of cereals and nuts.

There’s a flip chart, Luke and Tim share a desk then there’s a big squishy sofa opposite trays or ready-bagged muesli.

It’a start, but it is not perfect.

There are the frustrations of not having a decent phone signal for one.

Future plans include getting on the shelves at Booths supermarkets and setting up an integrated base where the toasting and the office are under one roof.

Work is underway to convert a building on land close to the home of Tim’s parents near Crofton.

There’s a better phone signal there for a start.

At present, they commute to the community kitchen in Denton Holme where the toasting process is done.

It takes around two-and-a-half hours to turn out 60 kilos.

The bagged muesli is then taken to the office for distribution.

As they tell their story, it becomes clear that they are cereal entrepreneurs.

Both sold pop and sweets to their schoolmates to supplement their pocket money.

Tim at Caldew and Luke at Nelson Thomlinson.

Luke invented a bouncy ball craze at his school and then bought a burger trailer off eBay.

This was decorated in a James Bond theme and named Licensed to Grill...

Tim, now 26, went off to study English Lit at St Andrews University and Luke studied business economics at Exeter.

After just two months, Tim decided university life wasn’t for him and joined a charity that worked with Roma people in Romania.

“I thought I would be out for a year, but it just grew wider and I spent three years working with the Roma,” he says.

He returned to Cumbria in 2014 and since then has worked in the lumber trade at Crofton, near Wigton and on the muesli business.

Luke, now 25, followed his good friend and also worked with the charity before taking up the post with Deloitte in September 2014.

Lakeland Mues is a business born out of pain and injury and it involves pain and injury.

Making the stuff is labour intensive.

The cereals are laid out on trays and have to be moved around every two or three minutes to ensure even toasting and prevent scorching.

Luke’s arms have their own scorch marks.

“The most painful part of the business is the toasting,” he says.

“But it is that which sets us apart from other muesli. It tastes much better toasted.”

Both admit to being commitment-phobes. For Luke especially, keeping options open is vital.

“Freedom is essential,” he smiles.

“We are so indecisive, we have a designated coin that we toss when we can’t make a decision,” grins Tim.

But when they do commit, it is all-in.

They certainly add some snap and crackle to their business.

They fizz and bubble with enthusiasm as they explain what they do and how it all came about.

It’s hard to believe anyone could be so excited about nuts, raisins and flaked cereals.

When the pair aren’t building up their business or mountain biking, they’re making the most of the great outdoors, rock climbing, walking and camping and cliff jumping.

That zest for life is reflected in their approach to the business.

Their road to success is mapped out, they just want to get there quickly.

“We are committed to a two-year ride,” says Luke.

“You know very well whether a business is a go-er or not after two years.

“We are enjoying it, meeting all these businesses and pitching to people, it is good fun and pretty varied,” says Luke.

“It feels like it is going well.

Tim adds: “We have to remind ourselves we are only a month in.

“We have achieved a lot in a few weeks.”