Lizzie Armanto

Previous spread: Just ‘cause you’re skating vert doesn’t mean you can’t be glamorous. Beyonce would love this!

Let’s get some basic stats, Lizzie.

I’m 24 and I grew up in Santa Monica and now I’m living in Encinitas.

What age did you start skating?

I didn’t really start ‘til I was 14. We had the crappy boards for awhile, trying to roll down the hill we lived on in Glendale. It was kinda steep so it wasn’t ideal at all. Then we moved to Santa Monica and my brother wanted to try it. Plus, it was the culture there too. You’d see people skating around. My mom took us both to the park and I wasn’t gonna have my brother be better than me. That’s what started it.

Were you good from the beginning?

I definitely had to work for it. My mom was a single parent. My parents had just got divorced and we moved to Santa Monica and I was changing schools again and it was a whatever time. My mom would let us come home from school, clean the house, do chores and then do homework or go to the library. So once we started going to the skatepark she was, like, “You can do that whenever you want.” So since it was way better than any of the other options we just started hanging out there.

This was The Cove in Santa Monica?

Yeah, it’s pretty good. There’s, like, a pool, two bowls and a street/flow course. There’s someone at the front who works there. You have to pay so there’s nobody lurking there doing anything really dumb. It was kinda like after-school care, which was good for my mom at the time because she felt like it was safe for my brother and I to hang out there.

Was your mom excited about you skating?