The HHS dive team consists of three divers in Jarek Arellano, Tim Zepp and Johnson, who compete separately from the actual swim team, but they are ultimately ranked together overall at each meet. The winter swim season is drawing to a close, as districts were held last weekend, where Johnson placed first in diving.

“We’re hoping to place better in states than we did last year, we’re trying to get to eight in states. We just had districts this weekend, and we have conference, regionals and states will be within the following weekends,” Johnson said.

Johnson began his diving career at Spotswood Country Club, where he discovered his liking for the sport, and later began his spell on the school team.

Diving requires, bouncing up and down on the board until the diver jumps, and getting into the proper shape or form in mid air to perform the dive. Other than in the pool, a good way of practicing these actions is on a trampoline, as it offers a similar spring. Obviously, it wouldn’t be quite as effective training as actually diving into a pool, but it’s about as close as it gets without getting wet.

“I got a brand new trampoline earlier, and we’ve been practicing on it for the season,” Johnson said.

At meets there are different categories and types of dives, they must perform certain tricks and display proper form launching off the board and diving into the water. One, but surely not the only, sign of a good diver is how small their splash is when they enter the water, which, depending on the splash size, earns the diver more points.

“My favorite memory would maybe be the first time I did a two and a half, which is just two front flips into a dive,” Johnson said.

Skills learned while diving could translate to many different sports as it focuses on balance, precision and requires the use of many major muscles, which could help the diver further in other sports.

“Diving gives me better body awareness in the air and I snowboard a lot, so it helps when I do that.” Johnson said.

The swim season continues with it’s conference meet this Saturday, February 8 at Sweet Briar College near Lynchburg.

Q & A

What are you excited for this season?

Seeing different people in this division in states. There should be more people and we can see different divers.

How did you start diving?

I dove at the Spotswood Country Club for a while and then I actually thought about diving.

Any pregame rituals before you dive?

Not really, I got to the last meet thirty minutes late, so I didn’t have a warm up at all.

How do you bond with your team?

Jarek, Tim (Zepp) and I all know each other pretty well, Jarek gives us rides, so we’re all pretty close and we do indoor track too.

What’s your favorite part of the sport?

I like the traveling, we went to Christiansburg for an invitational, so that was cool.