UPDATE: Lizzie Armanto to Compete on Finland’s Olympic Team

Despite being born and raised in Southern California, Lizzie Armanto will be skating for Finland at the 2020 Tokyo Games. Her dad is from the country, which allows her to join Jaakko Ojanen and Kasperi Kropsu in the pursuit of Olympic gold. With Lizzie’s contest record, this definitely elevates Finland’s threat level in Tokyo next year.

UPDATE 02.01.19: Lizzie was the guest on last week’s episode of The Desiree Show, and talks about competing in the Olympics starting at the 51:20 mark below.

Lizzie Armanto 1-22-19 by The Desiree SHOW

With the Olympics coming up, I’m going to be representing Finland. It’s kind of crazy, the whole Olympics thing and skateboarding. It’s definitely not popular right now. It’s important though; I think. I think it should be skateboarders leading the way, and saying: “This is skateboarding. And this is how we do it.” And keep skateboarding skateboarding, and not let it turn into something else… Back when snowboarding was first put into the Olympics, the top guys weren’t a part of it. They weren’t going to embrace it. That hasn’t stopped yet. So I think it’s important that skateboarders take care of their own.

Image Via Svenska Yle