Hi Everyone,

I just wanted share an update from last night. The dive team has many goals and we work on several at a time. Our goal for new divers is to teach proper dive techniques to allow kids to dive safely. Our goal for experienced divers is to develop their capabilities so that they can compete. We value each of those goals, as well as, other team and individual goals for competition. There is nothing instinctual about diving. Unlike swimming or jumping in, it is not logical to lead with your head, not to mention do twist and flips and jump backwards in a fashion that doesn’t allow you to see your landing spot until the last moment. Our divers must over come both their instincts and logical fears in order to complete most dives.

Last night we had victories in the form of some new divers overcoming those fears and performing dives for their 1st time in meet situations. We also had experienced divers gain victories with their performance of dives they have practiced for quite a while. Both new and experienced divers should be equally applauded for accomplishing their goals.

Now for the shout outs. Way to go Ingrid Lander, she was our highest scoring Freshman girl! Emma Fricke and Brielyn Niedzialek also did well for Freshman Girls. Blake Allen scored our first points of the season with a 2nd for Freshman boys! Sage Smyth was our first girl to score points with a 2nd in Junior girls. Evie Kehoe and Kendall Arnz led the way with a 1-2 finish intermediate girls. Mason Waterfield and Luke Jones followed suit with their own 1-2 finish in Intermediate boys. Alyse Madsen and Hazel Flynn placed well with their 2-3 for Senior Girls. Matthew Bray was his typical dominating self winning senior boys and Paxton Martinez missed 2nd place by only 4 points coming in a very respectable 3rd place. I did want to give one more shout to Luke Portofe. After a couple year hiatus, he returned to the team last night. He dove well and it was good having him back on the squad!

All that added up to a very close match. We ended up losing by 1 point 35-36. I know everyone will work hard this week to get prepared for Arlington Forrest next week and hopefully we can get back some of our 13 divers who were out this week. In the end, every athlete should have a goal based upon their level of experience and every diver can contribute.

see you at practice,

Joel