St. Petersburg, Fla. (WWSB) – Two dozen of the best men\u2019s and women\u2019s competitive high divers across the globe converged along the St. Pete Pier – well in this case, you could say above it.<\/p>\n
The Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series is on its second stop of its world tour, coming off first round competition in Indonesia.<\/p>\n
For the first time in the seventeen-year history of the competition, the event entered the Sunshine State.<\/p>\n
Among the favorites on the women\u2019s side was Australian diver Rhiannan Iffland, the nine-time defending Red Bull Cliff Diving World Series champion. After Friday\u2019s competition she sits in second place, one point behind American diver Kaylea Arnett.<\/p>\n
Arnett spoke on what it meant to represent the United States on home soil.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo it\u2019s always very exciting to have these home turf competitions,\u201d Arnett said after round three.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe crowd turns out really well, and it actually gives me quite a bit of nerves. But the nerves actually work in my favor. They kinda make me alert. Help me kinda stay sharp for the competition,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
On the men\u2019s side, French diver Gary Hunt is also known for his prolific skills and success, as an eleven-time champion in this competition.<\/p>\n
Heading into Saturday\u2019s final however, it was American James Lichtenstein atop the diving board and leaderboard. He holds more than a 21 point advantage over the next-nearest competitor, Aidan Heslop from England.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s amazing, I was really trying to feed off the home crowd today,\u201d Lichtenstein said after the third round.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a bunch of friends and family here, and was really feeling the energy today. It\u2019s awesome to be on top with the home fans being able to witness it,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Though the diving technically wasn\u2019t from a cliff, the competition did leave us with a cliffhanger.<\/p>\n
There\u2019s a chance there could be two American winners on American soil in the men\u2019s and women\u2019s competition.<\/p>\n
The final round takes place at the St. Petersburg Pier on Saturday. The women\u2019s finals are slated to begin at 1:10 p.m. and the men\u2019s finals are scheduled for a 2 p.m. start. <\/p>\n
ABC7 will have coverage from St. Petersburg on Saturday, and will bring you highlights in our newscasts and online.<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 WWSB. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"St. Petersburg, Fla. (WWSB) – Two dozen of the best men\u2019s and women\u2019s competitive high divers across the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":298074,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[68389,101457,68391,84289,125457,202,204,203,199,201,200],"class_list":["post-298073","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-st-petersburg","tag-james-lichtenstein","tag-kaylea-arnett","tag-orlando-duque","tag-red-bull","tag-red-bull-cliff-diving-world-series","tag-st-pete","tag-st-pete-headlines","tag-st-pete-news","tag-st-petersburg","tag-st-petersburg-headlines","tag-st-petersburg-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/298073","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=298073"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/298073\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/298074"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=298073"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=298073"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=298073"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}