About Me

Iris Schmidbauer

Athletic Successes

Education

How do you get crazy and start with such an extreme sport?

I started Diving in Utting at the lake Ammersee. There is a beautiful wooden 10m Plattform. I grow up close to the lake in Germany.
Since I can think, I always wanted to to gymnastics. But unfortunately that was not possible because someone would have had to bring and pick me up by car for every training session. With 13 I followed the Olympics 2008 in the TV and I discovered Diving. I was fascinated immediately.
After that I started trying some dives myself at the platforms at the lake. And I managed to convince my parents to let me go to Munich for a taster diving session. Thereupon I stared with trainings sessions once a month, later twice a month and finally once a week. I also went to a pool or the lake by myself whenever it was possible.
Through the club I met some Cliff divers and I found out that it is actually possible to survive to dive of 20m or even 27m! And I was fascinated again! In Barcelona 2013 I saw High Diving for the very first time life. In august 2014 I went to the International Cliff Diving Championships (WHDF) in Switzerland. I wasn't sure if I would only watch the diving or even try to jump of anything higher than 10m. But I ended up competing with 3 dives of 15m.
In November 2014 I visited a family in Plymouth, who I met at the Cliff Diving Completion in Switzerland in the Summer. During my stay I was invited to train with the Plymouth Diving Club. I enjoyed the training so much that I decided to move in September 2015 tomoved to Plymouth in order to be able to train 10h a week, having regular training for the very first time. I also started to study Sports Therapy at Plymouth University.
My first very big competition was already in February 2016, the Fina High Diving World Cup in Abu Dhabi. I successfully competed with three dives of 20m, being the only German and jungest competitor. I finished 9th. Since than I have competed in all Fina High Diving World Cups and Fina World Championships that followed as well as in several stops of the Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series.
Since January 2019 I am training now in Dresden, Germany with the national diving team with 25-30h a week. This gives me the opportunity to make even better and faster progressions in my diving skills.

Team

since 2019

Boris Rozenberg, Dresdner SC Wasserspringen

2015-2018

Fito Gutierrez, Plymouth Diving Club

2009-2014

Beppo Herweck, SG-Stadtwerke München