Red Bull Cliff Diving: Podium for the ‘Big Three’

Podium for the ‘Big Three’ While Female Texan Dominates At Home

The Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series' most successful athletes excel at US stop held under modified schedule on May 29, 2015

With two 10s from the judges and the highest-scoring three-second dive of the whole competition, Englishman Gary Hunt makes it three wins out of three with a new personal-best score of 533.90 points in Texas. The season’s third stop operated under a revised schedule due to the probability of severe weather conditions in the region and produced a World Series champions’ podium, as Orlando Duque, from Colombia, and Artem Silchenko, from Russia – the winners in 2009 and 2013 – completed the top-three from the 27m platform. The women’s competition, which kicked off the 2015 season here at Possum Kingdom Lake, sees Rachelle Simpson, the reigning champion from San Antonio, Texas, take first place from twice the Olympic height.

The hat-trick in wins went to the apparently unstoppable 30-year-old Gary Hunt, while Colombian legend Orlando Duque (478.70pts.) made it his third podium in three competitions and settled old scores with this location as he had finished bottom of the standings after a failed dive the previous year. Completing the podium was the third winner of a World Series, Russia’s Artem Silchenko (466.90pts.), who earlier beat American Andy Jones in his head-to-head by another very narrow margin, and leapt up from seventh place going into the final round of dives to secure a top-three finish thanks to a brilliant execution of his back armstand dive with a blind entry.

Texan Rachelle Simpson (243.40pts) dominated the first stop of the Women's World Series, meanwhile, as 10 female athletes competed from a 20m platform. Simpson finished ahead of impressive Canadian wildcard Lysanne Richard (222.00pts) and fellow American Ginger Leigh Huber (213.40pts). The women meet again in mid July for the second stop in the Portuguese Azores.

After the season opener in Cartagena, Colombia, at the end of April and the first 2015 stop on European soil in France’s La Rochelle two weeks ago, the stop at Hell’s Gate on Possum Kingdom Lake highlighted the class of this group of athletes considering the short notice of the rescheduling of the competition. High scoring dives, increasing difficulty in the women’s competition and a strong overall performance of Team USA with a win and a third place in the women’s comp and three athletes in the top eight in the men’s category – from the US’ Lone Star State the cliff diving elite takes the leap over the Atlantic and returns to Denmark’s capital city, Copenhagen, for more diving complexity at 85kph in three weeks’ time.

QUOTES FROM THE WINNERS
Gary Hunt (UK) The schedule wasn’t certain, but I thrive on that! One of the things I love about cliff diving is it’s not so rigid. You have to be flexible and willing to dive when you’re not 100 percent prepared. I’m really happy to have come through and put in a good performance here. Today the conditions were perfect and it sounds strange saying that because we’ve been talking so much about

the weather. I like it here and I’ve got my highest scores in this event. I don’t know why it is, but the temperature’s right, the water’s good and it seems to come at a good time when I’m firing on all cylinders. There was actually a tiny bit of disappointment not going past 540 because I have a bet with Artem. He broke 530 first and so we raised the bar to 540 and I thought I might have been able to do it here! Three wins out of three is the start that I hoped for, I’ve had four wins in a row in my career before [in 2010] and I’m going to try and beat that again.

Rachelle Simpson (USA)
It started off a bit crazy with the weather – we weren’t even sure that we could compete, so I wasn’t in my normal routine, but I wanted to come in strong and have a good start to the season and that’s what I’ve done, so I’m really, really happy. The girls are increasing their Degree of Difficulty and we have new girls competing. It’s so exciting seeing more of us wanting to get into the sport. I think this year is going to be a big race, as the girls are getting braver and wanting to do more tricks. It’s going to be an exciting year for us with two more competitions to come.

RESULTS STOP 3, POSSUM KINGDOM LAKE MEN

WOMEN

Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series 2015

Gravity-defying freefall punctuated by awe-inducing tricks – that is cliff diving. The sport's best athletes leap aesthetically from almost three times the Olympic height with no protection at all, except their concentration, skill and physical control. In less than three seconds, gravity propels the divers' bodies as they fall the equivalent of eight stories, reaching speeds in excess of 85kph.

Since 2009, the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series has provided a platform for breathtaking action and dives of incredible complexity, spotlighting the sport’s top athletes as well as young talent and in 2014 it introduced a Women’s World Series. In its seventh season, this rapidly-evolving sport will crown new champions during eight demanding competitions for the men and three stops for the women. Between April and September, this pure extreme sport will touch waters in natural and urban surroundings as well as remote and iconic venues across South America, the US and Europe and top it all with the season finale and the 50th World Series competition.

LifeProof® is the official World Series partner to protect competitors’ smartphones to ensure they can focus on competing, safe in the knowledge that their device is protected from dirt, dust, rocks and crucially, water!

ENDS

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