A skater drops into the deepest bowl at a 20,000-square-foot skate park in Santa Monica and rises from the other side to execute a round of flawless 50-50s, gearing up to catch air and not giving up until she lands it. The sound of the board grinding against concrete erupts with each try, heard all the way to the beach.
This O.C.-based skater is Michelle Yoon, and she basically grew up at The Cove Skatepark, shredding as a little girl alongside her dad.
At around eight years old, Yoon found her father’s old skateboard while they were cleaning out their storage room. Noticeably in awe of the board, Yoon’s dad gifted her one of her own soon after.
The family was living in Koreatown at the time, and Yoon first learned how to skate when her dad brought her out to Venice Beach, like so many of SoCal’s greats. But she really came into her own as a skater at The Cove, the park where she’d practice tricks for hours and eventually meet longtime friends.
“I always make this joke with my friends who don't skate, where like, you go to the skate park, and then my best friend is going to be some 60-year-old guy, and then my other friend is gonna be some eight-year-old kid,” Yoon tells us.