A BROMSGROVE teenager is competing at the IWWF World Under 17 Waterski Championships in Chile.
Dani Halford, who is 16 and attends South Bromsgrove High School, is one of six to be representing the UK in the tournament.
She trains at Parklands near Droitwich and The Waterski Academy at Whitworth near Rochdale.
The competition in Lago Los Morros, near Santiago, began yesterday (Thursday) and concludes on Sunday.
Dani’s mum Alison Halford said: “Training for this competition has been very unusual.
“In the UK waterskiing in the winter means battling the weather in a dry suit – so the kids have had to do that and then still had to prepare for water skiing in the heat of a Chilean summer.
“They have had to go out early to Chile to get additional training to get themselves in the best shape for warm -water skiing. I have been really proud about how Dani has coped with the additional training and pressure.”
Her dad Andy Wrennall added: “Dani is really lucky to have lots of support to be a world-class at water skiing.
“She has excellent coaches such as Nick McGarry and also support from her school to help her to cope with competition time off.”
Dani is competing in three disciplines. Picture by BWSW. s
The championships will see medals awarded in the three separate events of slalom, tricks and jump.
There will also be medals in the overall, where the scores in all three events are combined and team medals.
Dani is competing in all three disciplines – slalom, tricks and jump.
The three events
Jumping is a spectacular high-adrenaline event which sees waterskiiers take on a ramp of speeds up to 70mph, taking off and landing on the water to ski away. In this there are no style points, it is all down to distance achieved.
In Slalom the boat travels at a constant speed of 55km-per-hour (for women) in a straight line down the course. The skier on one single ski has to go through entrance gates and then virage from side to side, successfully negotiating six buoys before finishing. Each successful pass results in the rope being shortened, making it increasingly difficult to reach the turn buoys. Eventually, the rope length becomes less than the distance from the boat to the turn buoys so the skier has to use body length and reach to round the buoys. The winner is the skier who completes the most turn buoys at the shortest rope length.
And in tricks, the skier is given two 20-second passes to complete, demonstrating as many different tricks as possible – ranging from a simple 180 turn to a somersault with a twist. There are also ‘toehold’ tricks where the skier holds the rope with one foot. Each trick is worth a given number of points according to difficulty. Points are awarded only if the tricks are deemed to have been successfully performed.
Pre-championship preparation
The whole GB Team has been together in Florida, USA, ahead of the competition, taking advantage of some warm weather training – though a few days of unexpectedly cold temperatures over the Christmas holiday meant it felt more like home at times.
GB Youth Coach Charlotte Wharton, who is in Chile with the team, said: “Many of the team have been training in Orlando, Florida at Matt Rini Ski School with myself and Cole Grant.
“Despite the cold front to hit Florida, the skiers were able to get some great quality training in leading up to this event.
“For some of these skiers, it is their first World Championships and, despite the nerves, I know they are excited. I have seen how hard they have been training and we are all excited to watch them compete this week.”
She added Team GB was ready.
