College girls building up for world championships

STACK-TACULAR: Allanah Millar, left, and Jasmine Anthony at a sport stacking camp in Wellington recently. The two Wanganui sport stackers will represent New Zealand at the world championships PHOTO/SUPPLIED

Five years after two young St Mary's School pupils first raised their hands when asked if anyone wanted to learn sport stacking, they will get the chance to compete on the world stage.

Now teenagers, Wanganui Girls' College's Jasmine Anthony, 14 and Cullinane College's Allanah Millar, 13, have completed their preparations for the World Sportstacking Championships in Montreal.

They will fly out on Easter Monday with the rest of the "Blackstacks" squad for the competition on April 11-12.

Feilding's Ben Flightly will also be in the 11-person squad, while Marton's Caleb Arthur was an initial selection last year but won't be attending.

Costs to take part are considerable - around $5000 for each girl.

There will be around 250 competitors from around the world at the championships.

The Blackstacks will be looking to build on their efforts from the 2014 world champs where they won four trophies and 26 medals.

Jasmine and Allanah will be doubles partners at the event, which involves working together with each person using only one hand to stack.

The individual competitions involve getting the cups up in various pyramid combinations such as 3-3-3 and 3-6-3, then bringing them back down in the fastest time possible.

Jasmine and Allanah had been chosen for last year's Junior Blackstacks trip to Taiwan for the Asia championships, before the tour was cancelled.