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Laura started skydiving as a one-off rag week stunt at York University - she actually admits to doing it to try and get rid of her fear of heights!

But the skydiving bug had bitten and 1,500 jumps later, she was in Arizona among 30 women from countries around the world including America, Tokyo, Israel, Argentina, Russia, and Hungary taking part in the attempt to break the record for the Women's Vertical World Record.

Over three days in March, the women were put through their paces as only the best would chosen to take part in the final record breaking attempts. 

Laura with her feet on the ground

Sole Brit

When the final group to take part in the jump was selected, Laura was the only British representative among them.

However after nearly two days of jump attempts the team failed to achieve a formation and claim the record - but the final jump of the day proved the perseverance was worth it.

On 21 March 20 women skydivers, jumping from two planes flying at 16,500 feet (just over three miles above the earth), joined up in freefall and linked in a perfect head down formation over the Arizona desert before deploying their parachutes.

Vertical skydiving involves travelling 'head down' and consequently the skydivers can reach speeds of 180 mph, compared to just 120 mph which the conventional 'belly to earth' technique achieves.

At such speeds Laura said their wasn't any time to admire the view: "It was amazing - the atmosphere there was electric. It's quite exhilarating, you have to focus on staying controlled and still to present for everyone else to take the right grips at the right time.  It's all about looking at the right person and presenting the right angle to allow the person behind you to dock as easily as possible."

Hysteria

Aside from record attempts, Laura is part of free-flying team 'Hysteria' - who take part in competitions in which they judged on their artistic moves and presentation to camera while hurtling toward earth.

Laura is also keen to develop her skills in VRW skydiving - Vertical Relative Work- where four skydivers try to perform as many set formations as they can in the time available.

When she isn't leaping from planes Laura is a defence consultant for BAE Systems and proudly shows her picture of her world record breaking jump on her PC desktop. 

She says friends and family are also supportive of her career: "My Mum and Dad are really proud.  They were really proud last year when I went to the World Skydiving Championships for the first time  - although it wasn't always like that, they were a bit nervous when I started.  But all my friends are very supportive and a lot of my friends are in skydiving anyway - it's a very close-knit community."

Despite hundreds of dives at drop sites around the world, still admits to still not really liking heights: "I still have a bit of a fear of heights, but skydiving is so exciting, you just have to go again.  I realise now that's it's a fear of a realistic height, like being at the top of a ladder - with skydiving it's not really the same!"