It all started with an image of Sky Brown, a 7-year-old skateboarder from Japan who glared challengingly into Christin Rose’...

It all started with an image of Sky Brown, a 7-year-old skateboarder from Japan who glared challengingly into Christin Rose’s (@hellochristinrose) camera. “She made this project,” the photographer says. “Her knee’s all bloodied up and she’s just sitting on her skateboard with her turquoise nail polish chipped off.” Christin’s initiative #ShePlaysWeWin features in-your-face images of tough little girls in all their athletic glory. “The courage my life requires right now to take risks, be willing to fail, be a teammate and work on getting better is the exact same stuff I learned on the softball field when I was 10 years old,” the photographer says. So far, she’s photographed skateboarders, surfers, soccer players and boxers, predominantly in her native California, but she envisions going global. “If it helps one little girl go, ‘Maybe I could skateboard, maybe I could play ice hockey,’ it will all be worth it.”
Photo by @hellochristinrose