Diving

Diving requires a person to jump, perform acrobatics, and land either feet first or head first in water. Diving events include the 10-meter platform, 3-meter springboard, and synchronized platform and springboard events.

History

People have been diving for millennia in some form. A twenty-five-hundred-year-old tomb in Naples, Italy, shows a man diving from a cliff or rock. Evidence indicates diving during the ancient Greek and Roman eras. Evidence of diving during the Middle Ages and Renaissance is sparse, probably because water sports were not popular.

When diving became a competitive sport during the nineteenth century, people competed in “plunging.” The winner was the diver who measured the greatest distance from takeoff to depth in the water.The first plunging competition was held in 1893 and has continued to the present as the Britain National Plunging Championships. Frank Parrington (Great Britain) is considered to be the greatest plunger. His record of 26.4 meters set in 1933 remains a world record.

The greatest early influences came from Germany and Sweden as diving evolved from gymnastics, acrobatics, and tumbling. Early gymnasts from Sweden and Germany moved gymnastics apparatus to the beach and practiced maneuvers over the water. Diving was a good alternative, allowing athletes to land in water rather than on hard ground. Soon the sport developed into plain diving events and fancy diving events, which included acrobatics.

German and Swedish divers dominated globally prior to the two world wars; afterward the United States dominated. However, since 1984 China has been dominant in the sport.

Diving is more closely related to gymnastics than to swimming, but because both diving and swimming require water, the two sports have been grouped together. Thus, diving is considered an aquatic sport and is governed by the International Federation of Aquatics,which oversees swimming, diving, synchronized swimming, and water polo. The federation was founded in 1908.

Germany and Sweden helped to popularize diving, building on their strong backgrounds in gymnastics. Sweden introduced a dive technique called the “Swedish swallow” that later in the United States was called the “swan dive.” The dive was named because of its similarity to the graceful dive of the bird. It required a onefoot takeoff that was thought to give more control to the diver than a two-foot takeoff.

During the 1890s Britain gained interest in diving after the Swedes Hjalmar Johansson, Otto Hageborge, and C. F. Mauritzi visited the country and introduced fancy diving, which was being developed in Sweden. In fancy diving a person performed somersaults, twists, and so forth before landing in the water. In plain diving a person faced the water, dove, and landed head first in the water.Whereas Swedish divers specialized in the Swedish swallow, British divers performed the plain dive with the arms held above the head. Swedes dominated plain diving contests with their Swedish swallow dives.

In 1895 the National Graceful Diving Competition began in Britain. It consisted of running dives from 4.5 meters and 9.1 meters. According to the Amateur Swimming Association (ASA), this competition continued through 1961 as the “Plain Diving Championships of the ASA.” The first diving association, the Amateur Diving Association, was formed in Britain in 1901 and later was merged with the ASA.

Springboard diving, which allows a diver to get additional spring from the board, was introduced during the 1920s.The springboard has a movable fulcrum and was first used in competition in the 1924 Olympic Games in Paris. The movable fulcrum allows divers to adjust the pivot point of the diving board and thus gain greater spring and height to perform a variety of dives. As a result divers began to perform dives that the world had never seen before. For example, Peter Desjardins in the 1928 Olympic Games performed a forward oneand- one-half somersault with a full twist. Two of his dives earned the highest score of any diver in the Olympics. He averaged a 9.2 score out of a possible 10 for ten dives.

The first European championships in diving were held in 1926 and were dominated by German divers.

Rules and Strategies

Divers perform a series of dives for judges who score the dives according to degree of difficulty. The highest possible score is 10. Individual diving (platform and springboard) typically is judged by seven judges who focus on approach, takeoff, execution, and entry into the water.

In synchronized diving two divers perform the same or similar dives simultaneously and are judged on their dives and on their synchronization. Synchronized diving has nine judges; five concentrate on synchronization (how the two divers are similar in height, distance, speed of rotation, and entry into water); four concentrate on each swimmer’s dive.

Springboard diving has five groups of dives: inward, forward, backward, reverse, and twisting. Platform diving has an additional group: arm stand. Not only does a diver perform a dive from one of the groups of dives, but also a diver can select pike, tuck, or straight-layout positions of a dive.

Strategies include balancing risk and difficulty with execution. A diver performing a difficult dive with execution errors will outscore a diver performing a lessdifficult dive with no execution errors. Divers must select dives that not only have some difficulty but also that they can execute well.

During the years diving competition rules have fluctuated between mandating certain dives and allowing divers to select dives. Springboard diving competition has five compulsory dives.The top divers advance to the final round,where they perform six dives of their choice.

Today more than one hundred dives are performed. Most are performed with a head-first entry because it is deemed less difficult to control than a feet-first entry.

Top Athletes

Hjalmar Johansson (Sweden) was the leading pioneer in diving during the late 1800s and early 1900s. He was the oldest Olympic diving champion, winning the 10- meter platform event at the 1908 games at the age of thirty-four. He won a silver medal in plain high diving at the 1912 Stockholm games at the age of thirty-eight.

Annette Kellerman (Australia) was not an Olympic competitor, but she was a swimming champion during the early 1900s. She was a great ambassador for swimming, diving, and entertainment. She was considered to have the perfect body and pushed the limits of what women were allowed to wear in competition. Kellerman had a successful vaudeville swimming and diving career. She performed many high dives for motion pictures, including Diving Venus.

Ernst Brandsten (Sweden and United States) and Mike Peppe (United States) were well-known diving coaches. Peppe coached more Olympic divers than any other coach. He was the U.S. Olympic team coach in 1948 and 1952 and the diving coach at Ohio State University for thirtythree years. Brandsten was a 1912 Olympic competitor for Sweden and a four-time Olympic coach. He also coached the Stanford University diving team. Brandsten is credited with inventing the movable fulcrum.

Greta Johanson Brandsten (Sweden), wife of Ernst, was the first woman to win a gold medal in diving in the Olympics. She won in the 1912 games in her hometown of Stockholm.

Ingrid Kramer was one of the top divers from Germany. She won gold medals in the springboard and platform events in the 1960 and 1964 Olympics.

Klaus Dibiasi (Italy) is the only diver to win three successive gold medals in diving: in the 1968, 1972, and 1976 Olympics. He also won the silver medal in platform diving in 1964.

Victoria Manalo Draves (United States) was the first woman to win both the springboard and platform events in the same Olympics (1948). She was born to an English mother and a Filipino father and faced discrimination in some competitions, causing her to change her name. Draves was the first woman of Asian descent to win an Olympic medal.

Sammy Lee was the first U.S. male athlete of Asian descent (Korean parents) to win an Olympic medal. He won a gold in the platform event and a bronze in the springboard event at the 1948 Olympics and another gold in the platform event at the 1952 Olympics. Lee was the U.S. Olympic diving coach in 1964 and 1968.

Tan Liangde (China) won the silver medal in springboard diving at the 1984 Olympics. While competing internationally for ten years, he was a talented and consistent diver. Liangde usually finished in second place to Greg Louganis of the United States, who is considered to be the best diver ever.

Fu Mingxia (China) became the second youngest person in Olympics history to win an individual gold medal when she won a gold medal in the 10-meter platform event at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona, Spain. Mingxia matched the record of Pat McCormick and Louganis of the United States by winning a total of four gold medals in diving. She also won gold in both the platform and springboard events in 1996 and her fourth gold medal in the 2000 Olympics in Australia.

Greg Louganis won his first Olympic medal in 1976, winning a silver in the platform event at the age of sixteen. Because of the boycott of the Olympic Games, Greg did not compete again until the 1984 games. At both the 1984 and 1988 Olympic Games, he won both the springboard and platform competitions. In 1988 he dramatically won the gold in the springboard event after hitting his head on the diving board during a dive.

Pat McCormick won the gold medal in both the springboard and platform events in the 1952 and 1956 Olympic Games. No one had ever won gold medals in back-to-back Olympic Games before. McCormick was also the first woman to be inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame. In addition, Mc- Cormick’s daughter, Kelly, won a silver medal in diving at the 1984 Olympics and a bronze at the 1988 games. McCormick trained with fellow U.S. divers Victoria Draves and Sammy Lee.

Gao Min (China) won back-to-back gold medals in the springboard events in the 1988 and 1992 Olympics. She dominated women’s diving from 1986 to 1992, winning as many international awards on one board as Louganis did. She, too, is considered to be one of the best divers in history.

Aileen Riggin (United States) was the first person to win medals in both swimming and diving at the Olympics. As a fourteen-year-old from Newport, Rhode Island, Riggin won a gold medal in springboard diving at the 1920 Olympics. In the 1924 Olympics she won a silver medal in springboard diving and a bronze medal in the 100-meter backstroke event.

Xiong Ni (China) is one of only three men to have won five Olympic medals in diving. He won silver in 1988 and bronze in 1992 in the 10-meter platform event. He won the gold medal in 1996 and 2000 in the springboard event. He also won the synchronized springboard event in 2000.

Albert Zurner (Germany) won a gold medal in the springboard event at the 1908 Olympic Games. He also won a silver in the platform event at the Olympics in 1912. Zurner was one of the early talented German divers.

Competition at the Top

Diving (plunging and plain high diving) became an official men’s event in the 1904 Olympic Games in St. Louis, Missouri, although the plunging event was held only in 1904. Since 1928 men and women have competed in 3-meter springboard and 10-meter platform diving. In men’s diving from 1912 to 1924 plain high diving was also included. In 2000 synchronized diving, 3-meter springboard, and 10-meter platform were added for men and women.

Women first competed in the Olympic Games in diving in 1912—the year when fancy high diving was introduced. Women’s springboard diving debuted in 1920. Nonetheless, women were limited in the types of dives they were allowed to perform. Not until 1957, after the Melbourne, Australia,Olympics of 1956, were the limits lifted.

During the 1920s the pike and tuck positions became popular, making multiple somersaults possible. The first permanent concrete diving tower appeared in Paris in 1924. In that year Albert White, with the first perfect score of 10, won two gold medals, marking the first time a person had won both the springboard and platform events in the same Olympics.

During the early years of Olympic diving Sweden and Germany dominated. One exception was the Italian Klaus Dibiasi. In the 1908 and 1912 Olympics, Swedish men won all medals possible except one, which Germany won. Quickly, though, the United States began to dominate. This domination was reflected in 1932, when the United States captured all medals for men and women in diving.

The 1936 Olympics in Munich, Germany, featured the youngest competitor ever to win a medal. Marjorie Gestring of the United States was thirteen years and nine months old when she won the gold medal in the springboard event.With the onset of World War II the 1940 and 1944 Olympics were not held. Thus, Gestring could not compete in the Olympics again until 1948, when she just fell short of winning another medal.

China began its domination in diving with Jihong Zhou in 1984. Zhou was the first Chinese diver to be inducted into the International Swimming Hall of Fame and the first Chinese woman to win an Olympic gold medal in the 10-meter platform diving event. In 2000 China won five of eight gold medals, led by Xi Niong and Fu Mingxia. Mingxia has won four gold medals in individual diving. Mingxia won a fifth Olympic medal, coming in second in the 3-meter synchronized event at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games and becoming the first woman to win five diving medals.Three men have won five medals: Greg Louganis, Klaus Dibiasi, and Xiong Ni.

Out of the twenty-four possible diving medals in the 2004 Athens Olympic Games, China won nine (six gold), Australia won six, Russia won four, Canada won two, and Great Britain, Germany, and Greece each won one. Since 1904 the United States has won the most Olympic diving medals (128), followed by China (38) and Sweden and Germany (21 each).

Shawn Ladda