By Alisa Howlett
With many big wins, local professional dart player Kim Whaley-Hilts will never forget why she plays but mainly who she plays for.
Although Belleville native Whaley-Hilts intends on making the community proud, she is also playing largely for her late father, Bob Jones.
“I still play with the same shafts and fuchsia flights my dad threw,” Whaley-Hilts said.
Jones, before dying of heart complications, was a well-known dart player in the community, she said. He started the youth league at the Royal Canadian Legion on Pinnacle Street in Belleville. Whaley-Hilts leaves this Friday for St. John’s, Newfoundland to take part in her 25th consecutive Canadian National Championships. The winner of the National Championships receives an invitation to the World Masters located in England this year. Whaley-Hilts has already been honoured with an invitation from a previous competition.
Whaley-Hilts, unlike most players today, got into the sport of darts at an older age of 19.
“My dad was an avid dart player. So he pretty much got me started a little bit at home,” she said. “He said, ‘if you want to play darts you better start practising.’”
Practice is exactly what she did. Whaley-Hilts said she joined a fun league in the ladies dart league and started playing in some local tournaments.
“My dad played all the time. Whenever I would go [to his house] we always threw. We were always throwing. Whatever my dad liked to do, that’s what I liked to do,” she said. “We played almost every weekend in tournaments at some place.”
Based on Whaley-Hilts’ numerous titles, the practice paid off. Whaley-Hilts has been ranked in the top 10 in Canada for approximately 25 years. She has been ranked as high as fifth in the world. With the memory of her father and the support of her husband Wally Hilts and other family members, Whaley-Hilts became interested to see if she could be ranked number one in Canada.
“I started in the bottom and then it was like, once you see your name on the list, even if it’s at the bottom, then you start getting incentive. And then when you get to the
top it’s harder to stay at the top than it is to get to the top,” she said.
Whaley-Hilts was the first female to join the formerly named, Men’s Super Dart League.
“I was the first woman to join, because of my dad and my husband just allowing women to come in. [Others] didn’t want to. It used to be the Men’s Super Dart League, now it’s the Quinte Regional Dart League,” she said.
Whaley-Hilts said there are still men who do not want women in the league.
“You know right away. Some men get flustered, some men, it brings their darts on, but there’s other men that get right upset,” she said.
Whaley-Hilts said she is sure there are some ladies as well that don’t want her to be in local tournaments because of all her winnings.
“I am there for fun. That’s my release. I can have fun. I don’t have to concentrate,” she said.
That’s not the only accomplishment Whaley-Hilts has achieved over her dart-playing career. Whaley-Hilts established the Canadian and world ranked darts tournament,
called the Bob Jones Memorial. The tournament takes place annually in the last week of October. This is the 18th year that it has been around. It is held at the Trenton Airbase in the Astra Lounge.
Approximately 350-400 people from all over the world participate.
Even with all her accomplishments and high rankings Whaley-Hilts does not consider herself a professional dart player.
“It all depends on a persons definition of ‘professional’. Like, I say ‘I am not a professional because I have a job.’ It’s not my job. If this was my job then that would be a professional,” she said. “But other people define professional as what they bring to the sport, the way you present yourself, what you did, what you achieved over the years. I am half-professional.”
Whaley-Hilts admits she may be being modest.
Modest is the word when Whaley-Hilts almost “forgets” to mention that last year she received two awards of achievement by Quinte West Mayor John Williams. Whaley-Hilts jokes that she was inducted into the local sports hall of fame now rather than when she retires because she could still be playing into her 90s. The long-time dart thrower considers retirement but at the same time keeps winning tournaments, which makes it hard to stop, she said.
“I’m excited every year I go, just to represent Ontario. I’m not only going to represent Ontario, but I’m going to represent Belleville, Trenton, Quinte West- the Quinte area,” Whaley-Hilts said about her upcoming National Championships.
A fish fry fundraiser was held last Sunday in the community to support Whaley-Hilts. The proceeds go towards her lodging expenses.