High diving upstart Simone Leathead contests her first World Championships
For years, Simone Leathead said she would never high dive.
The Olympic Park in Montreal is blessed with platforms as high as 20m and Leathead’s coach, Stéphane Lapointe, would casually suggest the taller towers from time to time.
Leathead, born in Montreal, preferred to do her work at the 3m & 10m heights.
That is, until October of last year when Lapointe again approached his then 19 year-old diver. He was hoping to convince her to dive in the Trials for the FINA World Junior Diving Championships.
“I called her and I’m like, ‘Hey, you’re still Junior for the high dive, we just have to do a 12- metre list. Do you want to try?’”
In high diving, athletes remain in the Junior category through the age of 19.
Leathead agreed on the condition that they have a diving list, the collection of dives required for a competition. Together, they put one together and when the Trials arrived, Leathead won.
The victory meant an appearance at Junior Worlds in December, held in Montreal, and a step up to 15m.
Leathead won that competition as well.
“When I first started high diving I was only doing it for junior worlds, but then the opportunities just kept coming. And I realized I had some potential.”
Since December, Leathead has moved up to 20m, competed in her first Red Bull Cliff Diving competition, and qualified for World Aquatics Championships in Fukuoka, Japan.
High Diving at the World Championships runs July 25-27. The final for the women’s 20m is July 26.
“She’s a really quick learner. Not only has she learned a list, but she learned competitively,” says Lapointe. “She already has a DD (degree of difficulty) enough to be able to, if everything is good, she could medal.”
For her part, Leathead has relatively simple priorities, “I would say to do my four dives as best as I can. In the last two comps, I had two out of four that were good. I would really like to nail my four dives. So that’s a goal of mine.”
By comparison, Canada’s Molly Carlson, 24, is a high diving veteran.
The unofficial TikTok ambassador (with 3.7M followers) of the sport has become a fixture on the high diving circuit.
Carlson placed second at the first three Red Bull events of the season and won the World Aquatics High Diving World Cup held in Fort Lauderdale in May. Cliff diving events, by their nature, tend to happen outdoors. High diving is typically in a pool.
“I think winning World Cup reminded me that I am super confident in a pool. This is my element,” says Carlson, born in Thunder Bay, Ont.
“I do like to consider myself one of the best high divers in the world, cliff diving is where it gets scary. But high diving is definitely more my element.”
Lapointe also coaches Carlson and credits the years of the pandemic for giving her the time to focus on the sport.
“Also, it’s a lot to do with the personality of the athlete. She wanted to do this. She was following the Red Bull Cliff Diving competition before and she thought it was so cool. And she wanted to do it herself,” observes Lapointe, “And since then there is no turning back for her. She’s in love with the sport.”
Jessica Macaulay, 30, rounds out the Canadian females competing this week in Japan. Macaulay has announced she will retire at the end of this season. This will be her second and final World Championships.