NORTH Richmond's Aiden Thomas went to the Russian city of St Petersburg last month with high hopes of making the finals of his events at World Age Group Trampoline and Tumbling Championships.
Some might have thought it ambitious - after all, despite being a multiple national champion, he was coming up against the best 17-18 year old bouncers in the world.
But Thomas, 17, not only matched his goal, he exceeded it by far when he and his partner, Newcastle's Shaun Swad- ling, won the silver medal in the synchronised trampoline event on the first day of competition.
Thomas and Swadling qualified for the final eight in fifth place, and with scores wiped and all competitors on an even keel, they came out for their routine third and produced an outstanding set to score 46.50 points and take the lead in the competition.
With five pairs still to come, the Australian boys faced a nervous wait,
but of the remaining competitors, only French boys Redha Messatfs and Loic Dumaitre managed to top their score, and that was by less than a point with a score of 47.40 ? handing Thomas and Swadling the honour of being the second best under 18 team in the world.
It was something that Thomas, who finish- ed a credible 21st of 51 competitors in the individual trampoline and 23rd of 28 in the double mini tram-
poline after a mistake on his second pass, certainly wasn't expecting.
"I thought I might have been a chance of making the final but to come home with a medal was definitely unexpected," Thomas said.
"There was a higher level of difficulty than I was expecting, a lot of people were doing very difficult routines but it was a good experience to see what everyone else was doing and compare it with our own.
"It was the same routine that we did (to win) at the
nationals ? it was a lot easier routine than most of the other countries there and it was better synchro and better form that allowed us to stick with them.
"We didn't have enough skills to put together a bigger routine so we just stuck with what we knew and we were able to do it well enough to get second."
Thomas, who last competed at the world championships when he was 11 less than two years after taking up the sport, said that experience, desp- ite being so long ago, had stood him in good stead this time around.
"It was still a fairly big comp when I was 11 but it was obviously up on that level this time around with the degree of difficulty ? the performance of the international countries was a lot stronger than it was in Australia," he said.
"I think having been there at 11 helped and being older and more mature now helped a lot as well.
"After the second last pair missed out we knew we were in a medal position but we didn't know if it would be silver or bronze ? it was a nervous wait until then and I was pretty ama- zed when it came through ? it's a great feeling knowing you're in a medal position and for it to be silver, I'm pret- ty stoked.
"It was a great feeling seeing your country's flag going up the pole and knowing it is there for you ? it's a good feeling representing your country and even better to do well."
With no elite development program for trampolinists at either the Austra- lian Institute of Sport or NSWIS, Thomas said the result was a good kick-along for his move into senior competition and his ultimate goal of emulating Jai Wallace's silver medal winning performance from the Syd- ney 2000 Olympics ? the moment that inspirted him into the sport.
"It's probably a good headstart for looking at senior competitions in the next year or two," he said.
"There's a very tight competition for London and there's a few right up the top fighting for that.
"We only get one position at the Oly- mpics so you need to be the top Aust- ralian at the open world champion- ships to get there.
"I'm aiming at the Indo-Pacifics in Japan early next year, which is a smal- ler version of worlds, and then the London worlds in 2011."
If his record of overachieving his goals is anything to go by, competitors in Japan and London had better watch out, because Thomas will be a force to be reckoned with.
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