Amidst a day of cheering teammates, last-minute pep talks from coaches and a roaring crowd, junior diver Brooke Blaylock stepped up to the diving board in her first meet of the fall season. Like most events for the women’s swimming and diving team, the Pomona-Pitzer Invite on Oct. 24 brought out high energy from the athletes and ended with a record-breaking performance from Blaylock. In both the 1-meter and 3-meter diving category, Blaylock set new school records that had previously been set in 2011.
On the 1-meter springboard, Blaylock scored a 310.95 and a 288.20 on the 3-meter springboard at the Haldeman Pool. The score comes from a combined ranking from a panel of five judges. The team as a whole finished third overall, with a combined score of 1,083 points.
Blaylock transferred to USD from California Lutheran University and decided to take up diving midway through her sophomore year. After not being able to compete in the season opener at Pepperdine University on Oct. 10 due to illness, Blaylock went into the October meet with a clear mind and goal.
“I kind of just went in hoping just to get all my dives off the board and just see where I’m at a starting point in the season,” Blaylock said.
The swim and dive team brings a major support system to their events, hyping each other up and even cheering for rival teams, Blaylock added. Stepping up onto the board, however, requires a mental shift.
“I try to turn my brain off,” Blaylock said. “So in the moment when I’m off the board, I’m talking to my friends and keeping myself distracted. Then right before, I go through the motion of my dive and picture and visualize myself up there. When I’m on the board, I kind of just turn my brain off. One, two, three and go.”
Blaylock noted that diving often brings out her perfectionist mindset that was fostered by her years as a gymnast prior to taking up diving.
Her diving coach, Amy Alexander, came from a similar path, having pursued diving after an injury ended her gymnastics career. Alexander mentioned how a large part of her coaching is trying to dismantle the hypercritical mindset holding many athletes back.
“I remind them to make mistakes because you’re trying to make the corrections,” Alexander said. “If you’re making mistakes because you’re holding back, that’s not what we want to see.”
One of the ways the coaching staff likes to combat this mindset is by aiming to prioritize improvement over achievement, according to Alexander. Rather than go into a meet with high personal expectations, Alexander reminds the athletes to build their own self-assurance outside of a judge’s score.
“As a coach, one of my pet peeves is when coaches try and live vicariously through their athletes and base their self-worth on how their athletes perform,” Alexander said. “I would rather see the progress in the athletes of them building confidence.”
Alongside the mental framing, Alexander noted the correlation between being forward-focused and the players being goal-oriented. Following meets like the Pomona-Pitzer Invite, Alexander encourages the players to make note of what they were proud of themselves for, what they can improve on and picking one of their teammates to particularly compliment and uplift.
First-year swimming sprinters Eleni Charnas and Katerina Wietfeldt felt the effects of the team’s priorities even in their first few months on the team. Both came from high schools where swimming and diving were separate teams, and they said the combined program, known as “swive”, was a change from that experience.
“It doesn’t matter if you’re getting up on a block or a platform or a springboard,” Wietfeldt said. “Everyone’s going to be behind or next to or across to the pool from you just to watch what you’ve been putting in the work for.”
Wietfeldt said training sessions focus on small details so athletes can compete without overthinking on meet days.
On meet day, Blaylock’s marks replaced the school records that had stood for 15 years. Blaylock set both records in her first meet of the season.
Blaylock and her team will compete in one more meet before the midseason invite Nov. 18-21 at Utah Tech University.
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