Hawkins becomes X factor

LOS ANGELES – After 11-year-old Lyn-Z Adams Hawkins’ big brother broke his leg skateboarding, she knew it was the sport for her.

She learned the streets and ramps had a pull of their own and discovered she was more than just a tag-along little sister.

“Before I had kind of just done whatever he was doing,” she said. “But he broke his leg, and that’s when I started really getting into it because it was my choice to go to the skate park.”

Just a year later, Hawkins was competing in her first pro contest. By age 13, she made her first X Games appearance and won her first gold at 14.

Now an X Games veteran at 17 and a recent high school graduate, she’ll have her biggest showcase yet today, when women’s skateboarding will be telecast for the first time.

Hawkins will have to get past women’s skating trailblazer Cara-Beth Burnside, who has 13 more years’ experience and two more gold medals.

Burnside, 30, has won three of the last four golds in women’s Vert skateboarding and has been something of a mentor for Hawkins in the small, tight-knit women’s skating community.

After winning a Vert gold in 2004, Hawkins won silver behind Burnside in 2005 skating with a cast on her arm.

Last year Hawkins needed reconstructive knee surgery for a torn ACL and said the knee is still tender. She wears a knee brace under her bulky kneepads.

The new exposure for Hawkins and other women came out of a meeting on the eve of last year’s X Games between a group of female skaters and ESPN’s John Skipper.

Skipper listened and acted, giving the women TV time and significant purse increases.