The Norwegian Death Diving or Døds World Championships went down last weekend in Oslo and it was predictably both painful and incredible to watch. Døds is a form of extreme freestyle diving distinct from what you might see at the collegiate or Olympic level with a priority on athlete exposing themselves for the entire descent and curling up into the fetal position just before entering the water, landing first with their feet and hands or knees and elbows to avoid serious injury. Competitors from around the world launched off the 10-meter platform at the Frognerbadet pool complex for cash prizes and bragging rights. Enjoy.
Dødsing four main judging criteria:
1. Run-up
A døds must have high speed and power out of the tower.
Creativity in the run-up will be rewarded as long as it maintains power out of the tower
Keywords: speed, length, power
2. Flight
A døds must be harmonious in the air and appear controlled at all times. You must be able to see that the athlete knows where he/she is in the air toward a controlled landing.
Classic døds: They may have simple movements in the form of jogging, partial rotation, grabs, etc., but may not contain complete rotations.
Keywords: Flow, attitude, personal style, control, creativity
Freestyle døds: Must contain rotations and may contain other elements such as tweaks, grabs, and the like. The degree of difficulty should be emphasized but not at the expense of control and style.
If you perform the same trick in the final as in the preliminary rounds, points will be deducted.
Keywords: Flow, attitude, personal style, control, creativity, difficulty
3. Landing
A døds must be landed controlled in either shrimp (hands and feet simultaneously), bullet (knees and elbows simultaneously), or no-hands (knees and head simultaneously). One should show a clear stretch before landing and the more horizontal it is the better. The closing should be as late as possible.
Landing with the hands first (projection) or the legs first (underlay) should give a reduced score.
Keywords: clear stretch, late closing, big splash, hard landing
4. Overall impression
Personal style and steeze should always be part of a døds.
The judges will reward nice flow between run up, flight and landing. All elements should be mastered in a døds.
Scoring
Points are awarded from 0 to 10 with intervals of 0.1, and the final score for a jump is the average score of all the judges.
Døds Safety Guidelines:
- Never døds alone – in case you need help
- Døds diving is about skills – train gradually from the poolside, and don’t go higher before you are ready to do a controlled dive
- Always check the landing zone for obstacles – don’t take risks, and don’t dive if there are waves and wind
- Always have someone telling you when it’s clear to jump
- Measure the height of the platform to the water if you’re uncertain
- Check the stability and if the platform is slippery
- Always check water depths – recommended depth is 5 meters from 10 meters height
- Train your tricks from lower heights to master them before sending them from bigger heights
- We never recommend higher jumps than 10 meters – the risk for injuries is extremely high – even with perfect landings
- Don’t døds if you have any physical limitations, including limited swimming skills that might endanger you. And under no circumstances døds under the influence of medication, drugs, or alcohol.
If you want to know how to døds safely, take our online course on DØDS ACADEMY
