Inspired by Yona

Inspired by the journey of Olympic diver Yona Knight-Wisdom, Yohan Eskrick-Parkinson, the newest athlete to represent Jamaica in the sport, says he hopes to be that same beacon to increase its profile and its complement.

Eskrick-Parkinson, 21, who was born in Calgary, Canada, is the latest to signal his intention to represent the land of his father’s birth internationally, securing his citizenship, which would see him eligible to compete in the Jamaican colours at major events next year. That also includes the chance to compete with Knight-Wisdom in the synchronised discipline.

Parkinson said that his path was heavily influenced by Knight-Wisdom, who fuelled his ambitions in his first Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro 2016.

“The first time that I really considered it was in my last year of high school. I’ve known of Yona for a while, and he competed in Rio 2016. I watched him dive. I started thinking about what opportunities I might have through Jamaican citizenship to dive for them,” Eskrick-Parkinson told The Gleaner. “His story is really unique, and he is such an inspirational person, and he has a great social media presence. Because a lot of the coaches that I know who never even met him personally were saying that I should do synchro with him.”

Parkinson said his introduction to diving started when he was eight years old, jumping off the high platforms in the pool with a fearless attitude. It attracted the attention of club coaches in Canada who were interested in new recruits to join the programme. From there, he would start competing in events at nine and progress all the way to college at Northwestern University in the United States, with the ambition of exploring his heritage and also competing with Knight-Wisdom someday.

“Growing up, ethnically speaking, I was always more exposed to my Canadian heritage because it’s where I lived. So I kind of wanted to connect with my dad’s roots and really connect with being a Jamaican. And as it turns out, this opportunity to get my citizenship through descent has been the first giant leap towards actually exploring my Jamaican heritage,” Eskrick-Parkinson said.

“At that point, I had committed to going to school in the United States for the next four years, so I knew I was going to continue my diving career. I have taken little steps to see what opportunities I might have with Jamaica, and this was the first big step, finally getting to compete with Yona.”

Although he has had to juggle diving with his pre-medical studies at Northwestern, that opportunity opened up earlier this month at the Scottish National Diving Championships, with the pair competing in the 3m synchro event two years after Eskrick-Parkinson initially made contact with Knight-Wisdom in 2019.

Eskrick-Parkinson said that the one week spent in Scotland was invaluable to his own development. His immediate future is focused on the World Aquatic Championships and Commonwealth Games next year, but he has aspirations of an Olympic berth in Paris in 2024. He says he hopes to offer the same inspiration for Jamaican divers, similar to what Knight-Wisdom did for him.

“He did that just by leading by example. I just watched him dive, and it was inspiring enough, but I also know that he and I are both thinking about what we can do in the future to really bring the sport to the country and be more of an active presence in bringing diving to Jamaica. I am really curious to see what we can do there,” Eskrick-Parkinson said.

daniel.wheeler@gleanerjm.com