Doha high divers dream of Olympic stage

DOHA : A 27-metre platform perched above the Doha Old Port was Aidan Heslop's launchpad for a first high diving world championship title which one day the Briton hopes may be a milestone on the way to an Olympic gold.

Heslop's final dive on Thursday was a thing of vertiginous beauty - a forward launch, four somersaults and three-and-a-half twists pike rated the toughest in the business.

Straight as a pin on a feet-first entry into a six-metre deep tub, the 21-year-old from Chelmsford nailed the dive with barely a splash, triggering a roar from a healthy crowd in temporary terraces and a huge score of 151.90.

He had a nervous wait as the final divers sought to dislodge him from the gold medal position.

In the end, though, he finished just clear of France's runner-up Gary Hunt and hirsute Romanian, Catalin-Petru Preda, who took the bronze.

"As soon as I put that last one down, I thought I had a good chance, but you can't leave these things to chance," Heslop told Reuters.

"It's pretty nerve-wracking, standing and watching. We've all been in that situation before."

Simply watching as a spectator can be nerve-wracking.

Though buffeted by a stiff sea-breeze and with a drone-camera buzzing nearby, divers performed hand-stand launches from the edge of the platform.

The margins between success and painful failure seem razor-thin - but there are relatively few wipe-outs at the elite level.

They mercifully enter the pool with their feet rather than head-first and pretty much all high divers have a background in the regulation diving seen at the Olympics, where the highest platform is 10 metres.

Heslop, who dived for Wales at the Commonwealth Games, is confident he will be high diving for Britain at the Olympics eventually.

"I don't hope high