CHRIS and SUE ALLEN, 50 and 47

Chris runs his own electrical business, Sue keeps the books; they live in Torquay with their two sons

Iwas more of a surfer than a skater when I was a kid, and both groups were outcasts. Back then, those hobbies were something you’d get picked on for. We were very much a little clique, and I don’t know what the adults thought of us because we didn’t really engage with them.

Five years ago, I was on holiday in Newquay with my wife Sue and our two boys. They were in a clothes shop and I was waiting outside. Across the road, there was a shop window with a big, long skateboard on display, and I just thought to myself: “Wow, that’d be good...”

I walked in, bought the one in the window, and Sue said, “What on earth have you done?”

A friend and I went to a skate park and, obviously, I was terrible. By the end of the night, my friend had dislocated his wrist and I’d dislocated my shoulder – and I’ve never looked back. My wife started skating and so did the kids.

Youngsters seem to learn tricks so much quicker than those of us in our 40s and 50s, but if there is one big advantage to skating when you’re a bit older it’s that you can afford to buy a good board.

There’s a fashion side of skating that we’ve fallen into; you end up wearing what your peers wear. But that wasn’t really the thing that drew me back to skating. It was the camaraderie and the friendship among skaters that was the main draw. I’ve met great people at skate parks and through Facebook groups for skateboarders. Even when I’ve skated with the British national champion, there’s never any egos, just encouragement.

That spirit of encouragement seems to run through every vein. When I was thinking of building a mini ramp in our garden, I was given so much advice. One guy actually drew me up some plans with dimensions and measurements. Before Covid, we used to have regular parties and barbecues when people would come round and skate on the mini ramp.

It’s going to be very interesting to see the effect of the Olympics. Female skaters are catching up with male skaters, and if Sky Brown does well in Tokyo there could be an enormous reaction back home.