“I should have probably stopped earlier and that would have changed the outcome of how I’m feeling now, but I also wouldn’t have the trophy sitting on my shelf.”
It was the middle of the Red Bull Cliff Diving Series 2024 series and a 22-year-old Aidan Heslop was faced with a dilemma.
Suffering with major back pain, the high diver – who has competed twice for Wales at the Commonwealth Games – was at the top of the standings, with his ambitions of becoming the youngest world champion in touching distance.
He looked at his girlfriend, fellow diver Molly Carlson, and said: “I want to win this year, and if that means I need to take a year off next year to just recover from this dream of mine, then that’s what it’s going to be.”
As the competition moved to Sydney for the eighth and final round, Heslop was able to maintain his lead and win the world title, but it was not without incident.
“Just a couple hours after getting of the plane in Sydney I was playing chess in the park.
“A piece fell down and as I went to pick it up I just, it was almost like I got stabbed in the back, and I couldn’t even walk.”
“In that moment I was convinced it was over.
“If I can’t even walk how am I going to run to the end of a 27m platform and do the hardest dive in the world?”
Heslop has described how the pain affected him in a documentary called 444 days – The Long Way Back.
“The pain for the longest time had just been in my right glute, just shooting down my leg all the time.
“I’d have to get out of bed, brush my teeth and then lay back in bed in a foetal position.
“I never called myself invincible or anything like that.
“You always think it happens to someone else and never happens to you, that was my mentality and now it’s happened to me, I think I had to learn my lesson on that one.”
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As Heslop began his preparations for 2025, the pain remained.
He met with multiple physios and had medical treatment, but nothing could get him ready for the season opener in the Philippines in March, as he decided to pull out.
Two months later he met a doctor who recommended Heslop undergo back surgery, ruling him out for the season.
Heslop underwent surgery in Munich on 20 May, 2025, getting back on the 27m board on 27 January, 2026, 444 days after his World Series triumph in Sydney.
Exactly one year to the day since his surgery, he is back in action at the Kroya Waterfall & Kelingking Beach in Bali, Indonesia for the 2026 opener from 20-23 May.
In Heslop’s absence last year, Gary Hunt won his 11th title at the age of 41.
While Heslop would love to win his title back, the 24-year-old is realistic about his ambitions.
“As much as I’d like to stand here and say that I want to win the whole series and smash it out the park, I don’t think that’s my main goal for this year.
“Ideally I’d have 15 years in this sport still.
“This year is about learning how to be healthy as a cliff diver and what I need to do to have my body in a position where I can do this sport without hurting myself.
“I hope I can stay healthy, but there’s a little part of me that wants to kick everyone’s asses as well!”
“I think I’ve done cliff diving all these years, purely because I love it, there’s nothing else in this world that makes me feel the same as I do when I cliff dive.”
