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High dive

CP diving show has two world champs.

By BRANDI BARHITE
brandibarhite@sanduskyregister.com

SANDUSKY - Two world champion high divers performing at Cedar Point this summer jump from heights comparable to the tallest hill on the Blue Streak.

Orlando Duque of Colombia performs a dive Monday from 80 feet in the air during the Extreme Splash 2005 show at Cedar Point Aquatic Stadium. (Register photos/JASON WERLING)

But you won't catch these extreme athletes screaming on the 80-foot descent ... unless it's part of the show.

Danny Cosmo, 43, New Orleans, has been professionally diving since he was 4 years old, and won the bronze medal at the World High Diving Championship in 1994.

Cosmo also holds the record of the shallowest dive when he jumped from 29 1/2 feet high into a 12-inch pool of water, according to the Guinness Book of World Records.

"I didn't pick it, it picked me," Cosmo said of his daredevil stunt. "It was a gift from the Lord. I have never hit bottom or got injured."

Orlando Duque, 30, Cali, Colombia, holds seven world championships in diving -- three of which are diving from a cliff. The highest he has ever jumped was 105 feet from a bridge into an ocean.

Duque said performing in Cedar Point Aquatic Stadium is fun, even if the show requires him to dance and act goofy. This is his fourth summer at Cedar Point.

This year, the show's plot has a team of "misfit" divers facing off against a team of "model" divers. The divers do a series of exhibition dives as they descend into Cedar Point's 10-foot deep pool.

"You have fun with the kids and fun with the parents, Duque said, who dives 80 feet at 55 mph from a platform at one point in the 30-minute show.

Duque will leave the show at the end of June to compete in 11 diving competitions. Cosmo will leave next week to serve as a stunt double for a movie Matthew McConaughey is doing that involves diving. Later this summer, he will continue training the actor to do a small dive. Cosmo also doubled as Leonardo DiCaprio when he dove off a bridge in the movie, "The Basketball Diaries."

Danny Cosmo of New Orleans looks down at the water below while performing a dive in Monday's Extreme Splash 2005 show at the Cedar Point Aquatic Stadium. Fellow performer and the group's manager Mikel Straka is in the background.

"Doing live shows is different than doing movies because in live shows I get to entertain and make people laugh," Cosmo said about performing at Cedar Point.

One of the challenges of working in a 10-foot deep pool is that when you are 80 feet high in the air the pool's bottom seems closer than it actually is, he said.

For a more accurate view, a fellow diver creates waves to create some definition in the pool.

Even when it is cold and rainy, the Cedar Point divers still perform. Only when there is lightning and winds above 25 mph do they call it off.

This is the seventh year Cedar Point has had a diving show. The show is brought in by the Sacco Shows Inc., St. Augustine, Fla. The eight-member team at Cedar Point also includes national and college champion divers in this year's show.

"Every year we try to bring in a new show," said Mikel Straka, team captain of Extreme Splash 2005. "This is one of the best teams we have ever had."

Todd Bates of Detroit will take over the high dives during Cosmo's and Duque's absences. Cosmo will be back at the end of July. Duque will go back in August, depending on how he does in the competition.

SHOW TIMES MAY 28-AUG. 28

Shows daily except Tuesday at 1 p.m., 2:30 p.m., 4 p.m. and 5:30 p.m.; additional show at 7 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

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