Katherine_Driscoll

Kat Driscoll

Kat Driscoll

British trampoline gymnast

Katherine "Kat" Driscoll (born 13 March 1986) is a British trampoline gymnast, and has been ranked as world number one. She became a full-time athlete in 2010, and has since won team and synchronised medals at the World and European Championships. She was chosen for the British team for the 2012 Summer Olympics after earning Great Britain a spot in the Women's Trampolining following her performance at the 2011 Trampoline World Championships.

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Career

Driscoll was born in Chatham, Kent,[2] on 13 March 1986. She took up the sport of trampolining at the age of seven after taking lessons during her school holidays.[3] Driscoll attended Rochester Grammar School for Girls.[4] Whilst a member of Jumpers Trampoline Club in Gillingham (Kent) she first took part on the international circuit when she competed in the World Age Games in 1998.[3] Between September 2003 and July 2004, Kat also studied at MidKent College on a BTEC First Diploma in Sport course.[5][6] She had also been interested in swimming, but chose to compete in trampolining.[7] Until 2010, Driscoll worked full-time at bank HSBC whilst training. Funding became available from UK Sport enabling her to become a full-time trampolinist.[8] She has described the ability to take up the sport full-time as a crucial turning point in her career.[7]

She won gold at the Aalsmeer Flower Cup in 2009.[3] She has won the British championship twice, and finished in the top three spots on two occasions during the 2011 World Cup competitions.[2] Driscoll went into the 2011 Trampoline World Championships held in Birmingham, England, as world number one in Trampolining due to her high attendance and good results at World Cup competitions giving her more points than other competitors who did not attend as many.[8] She was described by BBC Sport prior to the Championships as "Great Britain's secret world number one".[8] She finished in ninth place, but, as National Olympic Committees are only allowed to send a maximum of two athletes to the Games, and China had four competitors in the top eight,[9] she obtained the seventh place Olympic berth for a sole trampolinist at the 2012 Games.[10] She would still need to qualify for the place in a series of competitions. She repeated that feat at the World Championships in Denmark 2015 by finishing 7th in the Individual Final, thus again securing a GB place this time in the Rio 2016 Olympic Games – the only GB trampolinist to secure two consecutive berths at the Olympic Games – and again, she will still need to qualify for the place in a series of competitions.

At the 2012 Gymnastics Olympic Test Event at the O2 Arena in January 2012, where the trampolining events for the 2012 Summer Olympics would be in July, Driscoll finished in fourth place.[7] Despite finishing in eighth place in the individual events at the 2012 European Championships, she won the silver medal in the synchronised competition alongside Amanda Parker, and was part of the British team that won the gold medal.[4] Just over one month prior to the naming of the British team, she won the North West Gala on 3 June, which was also an Olympic trial.[10]

At the 2012 Olympics Individual Trampoline competition, she finished in 9th place after the preliminary routines and failed to qualify for the finals.[11]

Personal life

Driscoll is married to former British trampolinist, Gary Short.[3]

References

  1. [1]
    "Kat Driscoll". Rio2016. Archived from the original on 6 August 2016. Retrieved 12 August 2016.
  2. [2]
    Richards, Giles (7 January 2012). "Olympic trampolining hopeful Kat Driscoll aims to hit new heights". The Guardian. Retrieved 5 June 2012.
  3. [3]
    "Kat Driscoll". telegraph.co.uk. Telegraph Media Group. Archived from the original on 21 November 2011. Retrieved 8 March 2016.
  4. [4]
    Hoad, Alex. "Kat Driscoll still not certain of Olympics place despite Euro medals". Kent Online. Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  5. [5]
    MidKent College Notable Alumni "Notable alumni". Archived from the original on 8 October 2012. Retrieved 4 August 2012. Accessed 4 August 2012
  6. [6]
    "FE students add to Team GB Olympic medal haul". FE Week. 12 August 2016. Retrieved 22 August 2016.
  7. [7]
    Bull, Andy (13 January 2013). "London 2012: Kat Driscoll aiming to break Team GB's trampolining duck". The Guardian. Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  8. [8]
    Williams, Ollie (17 November 2011). "Kat Driscoll: Britain's least-known world number one?". BBC Sport. Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  9. [9]
    Williams, Ollie (17 November 2011). "Kat Driscoll earns Great Britain an Olympic trampoline place". BBC Sport. Retrieved 5 June 2012.
  10. [10]
    "London 2012: Kat Driscoll moves closer to Olympics". BBC Sport. 3 June 2012. Retrieved 4 June 2012.
  11. [11]
    "London 2012 Olympics: Kat Driscoll agonisingly misses out on historic Olympic Final to last jump of the competition". kentonline.co.uk. 4 August 2011. Retrieved 10 October 2012.
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