Picture by Carlos Alvarez/Getty Images for Laureus
Pink helmet, pink board, pink socks, pink tutu.
Arisa Trew is adamant not be mistaken for a boy when she is at the skatepark.
“I didn't want to be like I'm trying to be a boy, trying to fit in with the boys. I was like, 'I want to be my own self. I want people to know that I'm a girly girl',” the Australian skateboarder told Olympics.com. “There wasn't many (girls) where I skated, and it was mainly boys. No one was ever rude or anything, but I wanted to show that I was a girl who was skating.”
Just a few years since, and still only 13, Trew is much more than “a girl who was skating”.
On 22 April, the teen became the first female skateboarder to win the Laureus Action World Sportsperson of the Year Award, capping off a breakthrough year that included a history-making trick first performed by skateboarding legend Tony Hawk almost 40 years ago. And she is only getting started.
"It's a really big achievement for me because I didn't really think I would even be here," Trew said at a press conference after accepting the award. "It's really exciting and I'm really happy."
Arisa Trew might not have made it into the skateboarding history books if not for one colder than usual winter on her native Gold Coast.
“I surfed a lot, and I still do now, and I was surfing and I just felt like it was getting a bit too cold in the winter,” Trew said. “In Australia, it really doesn't get too cold, but because I was 7 or 8, I thought it was too cold and I didn't really want to surf. So then I started skateboarding because me and my dad would sometimes skateboard on the footpath and then we just went to the skate park and I really started to love it.”
In the six years since, skateboarding has evolved from Trew's wintertime escape to a passion. The skatepark is a place where Trew has met new friends and pushed her limits.
“I love skateboarding so much because I love learning new tricks and it's the best feeling in the whole world,” she said. “I have so many friends that I've made through skateboarding, which I love skating with, and that just makes it so much fun.”
Skateparks, ramps or street rails – Trew feels at home in any environment, and wherever she is skating on the day, you can be sure she will be easy to spot.
Starting out, Trew was often the only girl at the local skatepark. Far from being shy about it, however, she dressed to stand out.
“When I was younger, I just wore pink tutus, pink helmet, pink everything,” Trew said. “I didn't want to be like a tomboy or anything. I'm just a girl who skates and that's who I was trying to be because I didn't have many friends that were girls that went skating.”
While Trew is now skating with numerous female skateboarders, her loyalty to pink remains strong and has become her trademark at the biggest competitions in the world.
The teen star dons a pink helmet with a chequered pattern and a pink board for every skateboarding event, sometimes also complimenting her look with striped pink socks.
“I've loved pink since I can remember. I've just always worn pink or chose the colour pink even with flavours of food,” Trew said. “I like pink flavours like strawberry or raspberry. If there's ice cream, I choose the pink flavour. Or donuts - the pink icing one.
“I just really like the colour pink and I don't know if I'll ever grow out of it or not, but it's a colour I really like, and I feel like it brings out my personality.”
Arisa Trew competes at the 2023 Skateboarding Street and Park World Championships in Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.
A pink-clad Trew shot into the spotlight in June 2023 when she became the first female skater to land a 720 in competition. Skateboarding legend Tony Hawk was the first to perform the trick, which involves two full rotations, in 1985.
Trew not only broke the 38-year male rule over the 720 but did so at Tony Hawk’s Vert Alert with the trick’s inventor himself watching on from a few metres away.
“For Tony to be there to watch me do it was really cool because he gave me some tips on how to do it and so did the other skaters,” Trew said. “Tony was helping me. He told me to duck my head and go under my arm. And then it started to get closer and closer, and then I landed it. And just for him to be there, at his comp, was really cool because he was the first one to land it.”
The Australian’s journey to landing the historic 720 was not a direct one. She began by practising the easier fakie fives, but kept over-rotating them.
“For some reason I just couldn't get it to the fakie five. It just kept turning another extra little bit, and then I thought I might as well try 720,” Trew recalled. “And then I started trying it and I got really, really close.”
With the Olympic qualifiers and the X Games in Japan coming up, Trew decided to put her 720 training on hold. When she headed out to Salt Lake City for the Vert Alert in June 2023, the 720 was not on her planned set list.
But then, she improvised.
“When we went to Vert Alert, I knew there was a best trick section and I was like, I might as well try it there, see if I can land it and then I started trying it,” Trew said. “Me and another girl Lilly (Germany’s Lilly Stoephasius) were trying it together, and I knew she was close as well, so we were pushing each other to land it.”
The two girls ended up going head-to-head to land the historic trick with its inventor watching on and giving both tips. But just as they got close, the women’s contest ran out of time and the male skaters took to the ramp.
Trew now not only had to fight to land her trick, but also to drop in.
“The woman's best trick, it ended, but they said that we have to keep trying it with the men,” she said. “It passed like five minutes and I couldn't get a go because all the men were really sneaky because they just wanted to land their tricks as well. And then I finally got a turn. I was like, ‘I just have to land it this try’, and then I did, and I was just so amazed by how I landed it.”
Hawk was one of the first to congratulate the history-making teenager.
“He was really happy and so was everyone else,” Trew said. “He was congratulating me and it was a really good moment.”
The achievement earned Trew the Action World Sportsperson of the Year nomination and win at the 2024 Laureus World Sports Awards, which were held in Madrid on Monday, 22 April.
Trew surpassed Brazil’s skateboarder Rayssa Leal and surfer Filipe Toledo, USA surfer Caroline Marks, Great Britain’s BMX racer Bethany Shriever, and South African sailor Kirsten Neuschafer to become the first female skateboarder to win in this nomination.
Despite her young age – Trew turns 14 in May - she is not the youngest to win. Fellow skateboarder Sky Brown was 13 years old when she received the Comeback of the Year award in 2022.
After landing a trick never-before done by a female athlete, Trew is already aiming for her next mission: qualification for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
The Australian skateboarding prodigy will be in action during the Olympic Qualifier Series starting next month to do just that.
Only the best 44 skateboarders in the world have the opportunity to fight for the final Olympic quotas at the two-phase event, which will be streamed live on Olympics.com. The first phase takes place in Shanghai from 16 to 19 May, and the second in Budapest from 20 to 23 June.
“To become an Olympian is my biggest goal,” said Trew, who is currently ranked No.11 in women's park. “I'm really hoping I can make the Olympics and if I do, I'll just be so happy because I've been wanting to do it for so long now, and all of my training and hard work would be just all worth it.”
As to the trick she wants to land at the Olympic Qualifier Series, Trew won’t reveal details, but whatever it is, female skateboarding is sure to get a fresh boost.
“When I learn a new trick, I hope that I can push the women's skating because then it's just going to push all the girls to start skating harder, and especially me as well because when I see other girls doing new tricks, I'm like, ‘Oh I better also start pushing as well,” Trew said. “Then it just gets the sport to another level, which is insane.”
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