In Competitive Diving Each Dive Is More Than Meets the Eye

Added: 12/08/2005

Competitive diving is truly a sport that is sweeping the nation if not the world. It may only take a few seconds to make one's way from the starting point on a platform or a springboard into the swimming pool. Put in those few seconds, the components of dive involve a combination of skill, timing and coordination. A dive is not a mere flight into the water - it is a subtle combination of successive actions. Components of dive may seem invisible to the layman, merging with each other to form a complete picture, but each of them contributes a great deal to the overall success of an athlete.

Competitive diving is a sport practiced throughout the whole world. It attracts the attention of amateurs due to the fact that each and every dive can be called a mini work of art. No wonder that dive scoring seems to be fairly rigorous - even minor movements of a diver's body are rigidly assessed by a panel of seven or nine judges.

Athletes can perform their dives either from a springboard or a platform. A dive, however, is not a mere jump into the water from a certain height - it is a succession of actions a sportsman performs from the moment he occupies the starting position up to the moment he enters the water.

Every dive is generally composed of the following phases: starting position, approach, take-off, flight, and entry. Each element should be performed according to the competitive diving rules so that a diver could gain a sufficient score. Components of dive refer to the position of an athlete's body making its way through the air. The position in which a diver is going to perform is expected to be announced beforehand. A competitor is free to choose one of the 4 positions - straight (body must be straightened), pike (body must be bent at hips), tuck (body must be bent at hips and knees) and free (this is a mixture of the positions mentioned).

In case of a springboard dive, divers initiate from the following starting positions - forward (an athlete takes off facing the swimming pool and rotates forward), backward (a competitor starts with his back turned to the water and rotates backward), reverse (a sportsman initiates facing the water, but rotates in the opposite direction, i.e. backward) and inward (a diver takes off with his back turned to the water, but rotation is done forward). What is more, it is common for divers to add up to 4 twists to any type of rotation. A peculiarity of a platform dive lies in the possibility to start the dive with a handstand.

Since 1904, when competitive diving was first included in the program of the Olympic Games, the system of dive scoring has been considerably altered. Nowadays, the performance of athletes in single-diver competitions is assessed by the panel of seven judges. The judges` activities are coordinated by a referee. While a dive is being executed, each phase of it is rated by the panel. The points awarded by each judge can vary from zero to ten. Once announced, they are put on the diver's sheet. The final score for a dive is obtained by adding up points given by the judges and multiplying this figure by the numerical value of the dive. Numerical value, ranging from 1.0 to 4.0, reflects the Degree of Difficulty (DD) of a dive. For the sake of a fair competition, judges are expected to award their points without consulting each other, right after being signaled by the referee.

As for synchronized diving, it is surely more complicated to assess. That is why, to rate pairs of divers, a panel of nine judges is employed. Their job is to assess not only each diver's performance, but also synchronization of a pair.

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