Child skydiver Amy Watson is a champion

AMY’S talent for indoor skydiving has taken her right around the world – as an elite competitor. “It’s the most amazing sport,” says Amy, now 11.

Amy Watson is Australian champion for Junior Freestyle in Indoor Skydiving.

FOR her ninth birthday, Amy Watson received one gift that just kept on giving.

“We gave her a party at iFLY Downunder, an indoor skydiving centre in western Sydney,” recalls her dad, Allan. “We had no idea how much she’d take to it or how far she’d go with it.”

It turns out that in just two years, Amy’s talent for indoor skydiving has taken her right around the world – as an elite competitor. “It’s the most amazing sport,” says Amy, now 11. “You’re totally free and flying - you’re just free to do whatever you want in the wind tunnel. It’s loads of fun.”

Particularly if you’re good at it. In her short career, Amy has achieved some amazing milestones, including becoming the youngest female Australian to fly head down unassisted and she is the youngest Australian to represent her country on the world stage.

This year she has trained with reigning women’s world champion Inka Tiitto in Singapore, Poland and Australia, resulting in today’s Australian of the Day becoming not only Australia’s junior freestyle champion but also the Polish Open junior freestyle champ.

Currently she’s ranked fourth in the world in the under-17 age group.

Despite her success, Amy keeps her feet on the ground at school in Sydney’s western suburbs. ”Everybody has heard about skydiving but a lot of them haven’t heard about indoor skydiving, so it’s not like I’m famous or anything,” she says. “I’ve taken a some friends [to iFLY] so they also understand the sport and how awesome it is.”

Amy says she has no trouble juggling school with training and currently has her sights set on competing at next year’s Wind Games in Europe and the 2017 world championships in Canada. Her great ambition is to one day be a world champion. “Maybe in a couple of years because there’s a lot of better people than me out there,” she says. “But if I keep on competing against them I can learn when I watch them I can always get better.”

Ironically Amy had a long-held fear of traditional skydiving from a plane (“I heard a lot of bad things in the news”) but nowadays she thinks she’d like to give it a shot. “Earlier this year we watched my friend skydive and it looked pretty cool,” she admits.

Dad Allan says if and when Amy decides to take the plunge, he’ll do it with her. “I think that’d be a wonderful thing to experience together,” he says.

Sounds like a nice birthday present perhaps.

CommBank has partnered with News Corp Australia to champion the Australian of the Day initiative which celebrates people in our neighbourhoods and communities who really make a difference to how we live and who we are. You can read all their stories at australianoftheday.com.au, where you can also nominate someone you know.