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Gravity-defying teenager Shaikha Fatima Al Khalifa is all set to soar against the sport’s premier athletes in the third Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI) World Cup of Indoor Skydiving championship to be staged in Bahrain at the end of the month.
More than 100 teams from 25 countries will be participating in the event from October 25- 28 and numerous world champions will be amongst the competitors battling out for glory, trophies and prizes totalling $200,000.
Professional indoor skydiver Shaikha Fatima, 18, who lives in Riffa, recently graduated from Ibn Khuldoon National School and has been training all summer long in readiness for the challenge.
“This is my toughest competition yet,” said the daughter of Shaikha Maram bint Isa Ahmed, the director of the Office of Her Royal Highness Princess Sabeeka bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa, wife of the King of Bahrain and President of Supreme Council for Women. Her proud father, Shaikh Ahmed bin Isa Ibrahim, and her brothers and sister - Faisal, Ebrahim and Sarai – will be cheering her on.
Among the competitors she will face are world freestyle champions Kyrah Poh, from Singapore, and Maja Kuczyńska, from Poland, in addition to world champions in 4-Way Formation Skydiving ‘Hayabusa’ and the 2-Way Dynamic champions ‘Windoor’ from Spain.
Others from the kingdom participating in the event include two Bahraini 4-Way Formation Skydiving Teams and the Ministry of Interior Skydiving Team who all train at the Gravity Indoor Skydiving facility in Sakhir.
This is not the first competition for the high-flying female as she successfully took part in the Flight Fighters 2017 event in Bahrain last December, her first international championship, notching a respectable 10th place.
She added: “I’m super excited to see my flying friends again. Even though we compete against each other we’re always ready to help each other out if one of us is struggling. I’m also excited to show my family what new moves I’ve been working on and I really want to make them proud.”
She also competed in the 2018 Windoor Wind Games in Spain last February and was once again ranked in the Top 10 having launched into competitive action in 2016 and 2017 with a second place in freestyle in the first FAI Arab Championships and taking the runners-up freestyle spot in the Mini Flight Fighters contest.
Al Khalifa says a strict training and diet regiment, as well as spending hours in the Gravity wind tunnel, has been the only way to compete with the top athletes. “This year has been very tough with regards to training,” she admitted. “I went to the gym all summer long and changed my diet to lose a couple of kilos so that I could be even more graceful and smooth in the tunnel.
“There are days when I would fly three-times-a-week and there were some more intense days that we call ‘tunnel camp’ where I had to fly every day for two weeks, spending between an hour, to an hour-and-a-half, inside flying.
“If you were to compare it to something, I think freestyle is very close to figure skating or dance. You have to create a routine that goes well with music and perform tricks that are difficult, to achieve a high score. For example, backflips, layouts and twists are needed, all the while making the moves look effortless. While I don’t have a signature move, I do tend to spin on one toe a lot like a ballerina!”
The Gravity wind tunnel has been prepared to host the teams during a pre-event training period by operating for a constant 24 hours every day and night for seven consecutive days, leading up to the opening of the competition. It will be the first ever tunnel in the world to operate for such an intense period of time.
Gravity general manager and head of the World Cup management committee, Khawla Al Hammadi, explained that Gravity’s tunnel was considered to be one of the tallest glass wind tunnels in the world with an overall height of 12m of tempered glass, with a width of 4.3m allowing for a speed to reach up to 290km per hour. “It is considered a pioneering initiative to support tourism, sports and the economy of the kingdom,” he added.
The competition categories include Indoor FS: 4-Way (Open), 4-Way (Female), 4-Way (Junior), 4-Way VFS (Open), 4-Way VFS (Junior), 4-Way Dynamic (Open), 4-Way Dynamic (Junior), 2-Way Dynamic (Open), 2-Way Dynamic (Junior), Freestyle (Open), Freestyle (Junior).
Al Khalifa’s coach Ben Roane, a world-class flyer from the US, who will also be competing alongside teammate Gravity’s senior instructor Garth Lewis, believes she has made ‘leaps and bounds’ in her training and agility and has great potential to progress further. “I think her skills have improved probably more than anyone else I’ve seen this year,” he said.
Al Khalifa’s high-flying prowess started with an outing to the facility with friends.
“We decided to give it a go just for fun and I loved it the minute my feet left the ground,” she said. “I couldn’t wait to come back again.
“After coming week after week, the Gravity team noticed my dedication and asked me to train professionally and compete in the sport.
“I love that you feel like you weigh nothing. I also love the control that I have in the wind tunnel as well as the adrenaline that rushes through my veins.”
The recreational wind tunnel enables users to experience the sensation of flight, through the force of wind being generated vertically.
Gravity Indoor Skydiving will be hosting the international event, which is governed by the FAI and sponsored and supported by the Ministry of Youth and Sports Affairs, Al Salam Bank, Ritz-Carlton, Bahrain, National Bank of Bahrain, Tamkeen, Batelco, Alba, Gulf Petrochemical Industries Company, Information and e-Government Authority, Bahrain Tourism and Exhibitions Authority and Gulf Air.
The first World Cup of Indoor Skydiving was held in 2014 at iFLY Austin in the US and the second was staged in 2016 in Flyspot in Poland.
For more details about the World Cup, contact 13100000 or visit the website www.wcis2018.com
