Why I’m Learning Vert Skateboarding at 38

At 38, I've somehow become more ambitious about my skateboarding rather than less.

I've skated for years, competed, travelled through skateboarding and built a huge part of my life around it. But recently I've found myself becoming obsessed with something that still genuinely scares me: vert skateboarding.

There would probably be a very reasonable version of my life where I decided I'd already achieved enough through skateboarding and simply enjoyed the level I was at.

Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be how my brain works.

Instead, I've started wondering: how good could I actually get if I really committed to this?

Why Vert?

I've always been drawn to transition skating, but proper vert is different.

The speed is different. The scale is different. And psychologically, standing at the top of a vert ramp feels very different from skating a smaller quarter pipe or mini ramp.

Vert is literally the point where transition reaches vertical, and developing the rhythm and speed required to skate it properly is a skill in itself.

That's exactly why I like it.

There are tricks I can do confidently on smaller transition that suddenly become completely different propositions when I start taking them onto bigger ramps.

It has forced me to become a more deliberate skateboarder.

Being 38 Has Actually Made This More Interesting

There is an assumption in sport — and particularly around female athletes — that ambition is something you're supposed to gradually relinquish as you get older.

I don't particularly agree.

Obviously I'm not pretending that being 38 is physiologically identical to being 16. Recovery matters. Strength matters. Training intelligently matters.

But I also have things now that I didn't have when I was younger.

I'm stronger. I understand my body better. I understand my skating better. And perhaps most importantly, I'm much more intentional about what I want.

I'm not learning vert because somebody expects me to.

I'm doing it because I really want to know how far I can take it.

The Women Pushing Transition Skateboarding Have Inspired Me

Watching the progression of women's skateboarding has definitely contributed to this.

Seeing skateboarders like Sky Brown, Lizzie Armanto and Cocona Hiraki skate transition at such an incredible level inevitably changes your perception of what is possible.

Then there is the younger generation coming through Britain.

Watching skaters like Lola Tambling and Lilly Strachan progressing has made me want to push myself rather than become comfortable with where I already am.

I'm not comparing my level to theirs. That's not the point.

The inspiration comes from watching women take skateboarding seriously, push the level and refuse to put an arbitrary ceiling on what they might be capable of.

That's the mentality I want to bring into my own skating.

Starting Again at Something You're Already Good At

One of the strange things about learning vert after skating for years is suddenly feeling like a beginner again.

I know how to skateboard.

Then I stand on a massive vert ramp and occasionally my brain seems to forget that entirely.

Things that feel automatic elsewhere suddenly require another level of commitment.

But I think that's probably good for me.

Being comfortable at something can become addictive. You naturally gravitate towards the tricks and terrain where you know you're going to look good.

Vert doesn't really allow me to do that yet.

There are sessions where I'm genuinely battling myself just to commit to something I know I'm physically capable of doing.

And when I finally do it, the feeling is incredible.

Training, Energy Drinks and Action Sports Culture

The more seriously I've started taking vert, the more interested I've become in everything around the skating itself.

A proper vert session takes a surprising amount out of you. You're repeatedly climbing back up the ramp, skating at speed, trying something that requires complete concentration and then doing it all over again.

I'm definitely someone who turns up to skate with an energy drink in my hand, and there's something about that whole world — skateparks, travelling, filming, music, energy drinks and spending hours trying to land one trick — that I've always loved.

Brands like Red Bull have become so intertwined with action sports that it's difficult for me to separate the two. I've grown up seeing Red Bull involved in skateboarding and supporting athletes doing genuinely ridiculous things, and I've always loved that side of skate culture.

As I've become more serious about vert, I've also realised that I want to approach the physical side of skateboarding more seriously.

Not because I want skateboarding to suddenly feel like conventional sports training. Almost the opposite.

I want to be stronger, fitter and better prepared so that when I get on the ramp, I can skate harder for longer and keep trying the things that scare me.

At 38, I'm probably not going to give up the energy drinks either.

My Goal Isn't Just to “Skate Vert”

I don't want this to become something where I can technically drop into a vert ramp, do a couple of tricks and say I'm a vert skater.

I want to actually become good at it.

That means developing proper speed and confidence, taking the tricks I already have onto bigger transition and gradually building a genuine vert trick selection.

I'm currently working on progressing tricks such as frontside disasters, frontside 50-50s, airs and blunt variations, while becoming increasingly comfortable simply moving around a proper vert ramp at speed.

And once those things become comfortable, I'll want something harder.

That's inevitably how this works.

I Don't Think Ambition Has an Expiry Date

Maybe this is ultimately why learning vert at 38 has become so important to me.

I'm interested in challenging the idea that there is a particular age when you're supposed to stop trying to become significantly better at something.

Especially as a woman.

There is so much conversation about young sporting talent — understandably — but far less about what happens when an adult woman decides she isn't finished progressing.

I don't know exactly where my ceiling in skateboarding is.

That's what makes this exciting.

Maybe I'll spend the next year training vert and discover that I can take my skating much further than I currently imagine.

Maybe certain tricks will take me six months that somebody younger learns in six weeks.

I don't really care.

I would rather spend the next few years finding out what I'm capable of than decide at 38 that I already know.

What's Next

For now, the plan is simple: skate more vert.

Get comfortable with speed. Take the tricks I already have higher. Learn new ones. Keep competing. Keep filming. Keep putting myself in situations that make me slightly uncomfortable.

British skateboarding has an incredible generation of female skateboarders coming through, and watching the progression happening around me has made me more ambitious about my own skating than I've been in a long time.

I'm 38.

I'm still learning.

And I'm nowhere near finished.