There is some saying about how “nobody gains a minute of life by worrying,” and I am pretty sure Lolo Derminio has not wasted a single minute stressing out about anything to do with her snowboarding. Rolling with the ups and downs of being a pro, through injuries, sponsor changes, travel—Lolo’s attitude and appreciation toward it all has never wavered. Maybe it is because she started riding later in life, or maybe it comes with the territory of being the youngest of five siblings. As one of the newest faces on the Rome Snowboards roster (as well as Beyond Medals), her footage is becoming as sought after as her piano skills at any bar or lounge after a day of riding. After a few weeks of trying to wrangle her on the phone for an interview, we got ahold of Lolo to chat between some late-spring trips, just as the new team announcements dropped online. Enjoy!

Mark Clavin:
Well, big day! You just got announced as the new pro for Rome!

Lolo Derminio:
Thanks—love running their boards. Very grateful and stoked to be— [Phone cuts out.]

You just hang up on me?
I don’t know. I was talking and then— [Phone cuts out.]

OK, that’s twice. This is starting to feel personal.
I’m in Arizona. My brother just said it was connecting to the Bluetooth speaker inside and they were hearing our conversation. I’m not the best with technology.

Good thing Rome is not a cell phone company.
True. I kind of just back what they’re doing. The people behind the desks are pretty dope, and all the people on the boards are pretty dope, and the boards are dope, so yeah. The Rene-Gade is the best board I’ve ever ridden in my entire life. 

Alright, box checked. We can end the interview now and your sponsor will be happy. 
[Laughs.] I had a few other offers, but I liked what they have going on. They have been pretty Euro heavy for the past bit but just added a ton of Americans. 

Is it true that you didn’t start snowboarding until 19?
I learned how to turn when I was younger, but I didn’t have access to go snowboarding whenever I wanted until I was 19.

And how old are you now?
Twenty-seven. I’m getting old.

So you’ve been on the track for almost a decade.
Yeah. I’d say my first sponsors were around 21, and then I had knee surgery at 22, then started riding again maybe two years ago. I don’t know. It’s been ups and downs. I still feel like I have not snowboarded at all.

If you are from Arizona, do you consider Snowbowl your home hill?
People ask me that all the time. Snowbowl, or the Remarkables in New Zealand, is where I started to ride the most. I transferred up to Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff and started working on the mountain. They had a program in New Zealand as well, so I would go out there in the summer to work in the mountains as often as I could to make up time for not being on snow as a kid.

So what were you doing when you were growing up in Cave Creek, Arizona?
Played a lot of golf. Which is why I think it’s so funny, like, golf is the cool thing to do now between the skating and snowboarding community. And I’m like, “You guys don’t understand how stupid this sport is.”

Make us understand: Why is golf stupid?
I mean, it’s probably just “the grass is always greener” type of shit, you know? Like, I would have loved to grow up on snow, but I live in the desert. People that grew up on snow love the warm-weather activities and think golf is the coolest thing ever.

But you weren’t just a recreational golfer. I heard you were a child prodigy.
I mean, I didn’t even want to play in high school, because I quit when I was, like, 13, but I guess yes, you could say that. 

You had offers to go to D1 colleges to play golf, right?
Yeah. I mean, my family’s just very into golf. And so because of my older brothers and my dad, like, people knew my last name. My brother played in a few PGA stops and then in the Gateway and Canadian [tours].

But you ended up a college athlete anyway?
Yeah, in lacrosse. It was fun. You could hit people, you know? I had the most yellow cards in the state of Arizona two years in a row.

Does your record still stand?
I think, but I don’t know. I have no idea.

How did you find snowboarding, then?
My mother! She grew up skiing… [Pauses.] I feel like now that I’ve had a couple interviews, I feel like I say the same shit all the time, and I feel weird.

Then just start lying. Say Shaun White is your mother. Don’t worry, I’ve got some new questions for you, but this is just how you start every interview, OK? Have to cover the basics.
[Laughs.] Well my actual mom is from upstate New York, and she loves skiing. She was always telling me and my brothers to move to the mountains, because she knew what was up. And it’s not that my dad wasn’t supportive—he’s always been in orthopedics and, like, sports-medicine stuff, so snowboarding injuries and action sports is where he would make a lot of his money, because everybody gets hurt. When you buy the knee braces and everything, and all the tools for recovery, that’s him. 

Oh, so your family directly makes money off of our injuries. That’s hilarious.
Well, now he’s retired, but my brother does the same thing, and yes.

So after some summers in New Zealand, you ended up in Colorado?
Yeah—I just turned 21, and weed was legal. Thought it was a good choice but only ended up staying for one season. I think I was, like, going to try to get a job at Woodward, but I just wanted to ride Copper all the time. I worked at a shop so I could ride during the day. 

Most memorable time from your season in Colorado?
I got plastic surgery on my eyelid. I kneed myself in the face going too big on a powder day. Went way further than I meant to, bashed my face and bit a hole straight through my tongue. I thought that the blood on my eye was just from my tongue, but I had to get rushed to the hospital somewhere. I don’t really remember.

Yeah, you were probably pretty concussed.
Yeah—was very confused about everything. I just remember saying, “Don’t worry—this isn’t my moneymaker. Can we just stitch this shit up and I go snowboarding?” But I do remember one of the doctors at the Copper med center was really hot, and he told me I could snowboard the next day. Then, I guess, he turned to my friend and was like, “No, she’s going to get surgery.” And that is why I will never trust beautiful men. But yeah, plastic surgery on the eyelid. I’m a fake bitch now.

Amazing.
Had to wear an eye patch for a bit. Funny full-circle moment: The first time I met Matt Stillman, who is now my team manager for Rome, I had an eye patch on in Denver at SIA. 

He kinda looks like a pirate as well. Maybe that is why he ended up signing you.
Yeah, we will never know. After my knee surgery, I kind of just resurfaced—rose out of the ashes, I guess, from Phoenix.

So when did you get knee surgery?
COVID year—it is all coming back. I got an invite to Hot Dogs and Handrails when I was in New Zealand. I shattered my collarbone at Bear because I didn’t realize that there was plywood and stuff under the course. I normally am pretty good at falling, and just did my classic, like, tuck and roll and just rolled straight onto the plywood, and my collarbone was basically sticking out. But that knocked me out for the early season, and then I was in Tahoe later in the winter and blew out my knee. Hit a hip and landed flat. My knee felt insane, so I started riding switch a lot. But then, when we started skating, because the mountains got shut down from COVID, I knew something was wrong because sometimes my knee would kind of work and sometimes it wouldn’t. Had Robb Blackaby, a family friend that is a PT, check me out back home, and my meniscus was terrible, my ACL was gone. No more snowboarding for two years.

What kept you sane for those two years?
I tried to look at the bright sides of it, like, “I can spend time with my family.” I played a lot of music. I like guitar and piano a lot. I read a bunch of books. I talk to God a lot. Honestly, he’s pretty good at the whole “giving you peace in shitty situations,” in my opinion.

Would you consider yourself religious?
I don’t like the word “religious” because I think it’s very skewed these days, but I definitely believe in God. I don’t know why it’s something that people don’t talk about, but it’s, like, one of those gray areas of things. And I’m like, “Dude, I have seen so much shit that I can’t not believe.” And then literally I’ve had people pray over my knee, and it would bend a lot more than it did before.

Then why did it take two years to come back?
Well, I thought I was done. I thought I’d never go back to snow. Did PT and all that, but a lot of people come back after nine months and end up getting injured again. So I moved to Mexico and went to find happiness somewhere else. When I came back home for Christmas and stopped by the doctor and he fully cleared me, which was about 2 1/2 years after surgery, I went up to Flagstaff with my mom to teach my niece how to ski and took some turns. It was crazy how good my knee worked, and, honestly, nothing makes me happier than being strapped in and riding, so I kind of have just gone berserko-mode since then.

That’s when I met Jordan Brown and became close with the Warbles. Started going to events all over. I knew Dillon Henricksen just from being in and out around Mammoth, and he ended up letting me hop on and film for Buster through Sims and Monster and all that. Very grateful to that crew for letting me jump on their thing. We only filmed for Buster for, like, a total of, like, three weeks. And then meeting everyone around eventually led to filming for Horsepower. 

What other brands did you ride for before Rome?
Signal, Sims—I bought a lot of boards for a few seasons because I broke a lot of boards. That’s when I realized I couldn’t ride women’s boards. I broke a Capita first day. I tried to ride Jess [Kimura]’s Danger Pony. Love her, but was like, “Hmm.” Then I broke some Nitros. I ripped the base plate out of it with my binding on.

Lacrosse strength. What were you trying, breaking all these boards?
I was trying to ride the big line at Cardrona and was knuckling or going way too big. I don’t really know how to gauge my speed on jumps sometimes.

Do you put a lot of pressure on yourself?
I try not to. I have high expectations for myself, but I don’t really think pressure helps anything. Some people perform, like, super well under pressure, but I prefer to have, like—just, like, the best, chillest vibes ever.

Filming versus rail jams?
Filming is definitely way harder in the bigger picture, but the actual “performing” that you’re expected to do at rail jams, regardless of the conditions or of the setup or whatever, can be a bit much. I’m starting to get a lot less drawn to them. At the last few jams, I wasn’t there to snowboard my best. I just try to remind the girls why we’re snowboarding and have fun and get them to just, like, chill out a little bit.

Any tips for people trying to make it in snowboarding today?
My thoughts are, “Everyone do whatever the fuck you wanna do—it doesn’t matter.” I think everyone is way too up in everyone’s business all the time.

You must be doing something right, since you have also just joined the Beyond Medals crew.
Thanks! I had met some of them throughout different events. I wasn’t really thinking about trying to get on, since they didn’t really have any Americans. But those are the best people I know, on and off of snowboards. I’m so grateful to those dudes; I had never been on a powder trip, and they took me to Japan. I learned a lot from riding with them.

Any big plans for this upcoming winter?
Probably similar things—filming with Beyond Medals and Rome—but kind of trying to have it a little more planned out. Right now, it’s just focusing on early-season warmups. I have learned the hard way [that] if I don’t ride park a lot in preseason, I don’t snowboard as well.

Do you want to continue to focus on street, or do you want to go into the backcountry as well?
All of the above. That’s the dream.