By Josh Wegman
Ten local athletes showed they were worthy of their place amongst the nation’s elite as the Ottawa National Diving Club hosted over 175 of Canada’s top youth divers from March 20-23 at the Nepean Sportsplex.
Officially it was the Ontario Spring Provincial Championships, but with the prize of an opportunity to qualify for a Dive Canada-supported trip to Dresden, Germany for a top youth international competition on the line, the event drew the country’s best juniors from coast to coast.
“We were extremely honoured when we were given this meet,” says ONDC head competitive coach Kathleen Murphy, who founded the club in 2007.
Calling the event “an overwhelming success,” hosting the club’s first meet – a major one, at that – represents another major milestone for ONDC, Murphy indicates.
“I received a lot of help from Dive Canada and support from many parent volunteers and other clubs in Ontario,” she adds. “I can’t thank them enough.”
Sportsmanship is what Murphy emphasizes most to her athletes most – “win humbly and lose the same way,” she says – although they certainly showed off plenty of technical ability as well, with Timothy Lewis, Kathryn Grant and Emma Corrigan all coming away with at least one top-4 finish.
The 20th-place finisher from last year’s nationals, Corrigan leapt way up the girls’ D group (age 10-11) ladder with a silver medal performance in the platform event, just ahead of teammate Grant in the bronze medal position.
The Grade 5 Le Phare Elementary School student believes that the pressure of being the host club can only be beneficial.
“Being under pressure gets us to work harder and to do our best so we can beat our toughest competitors,” Corrigan highlights.
Lewis, who finished fourth in the men’s D-group 3m finals, also considers competing at their home pool to be advantageous.
“It’s nice to hear a lot of cheering coming from our club (members) even though they’re not competing. They’re here to support us,” underlines the Elmdale Public School student who placed 13th nationally as a nine-year-old in D group last year.
McKay jumping for junior worlds
Henry McKay of the Nepean-Ottawa Diving Club has worn Canadian colours before, and he’d like to do it again, ideally on a bigger stage.
Despite a broken foot that kept him out of competition most of last season, McKay finished off 2013 with gold and bronze medal wins at the Pan American Junior Diving Championships. He’s got his eyes on reaching the World Junior Championships next.
McKay’s high expectations are part of the reason he was unsatisfied with his showing at the provincials (second on 1 m, fifth on 3 m and 10th on platform), grading his overall performance a 7 out of 10.
The fact that it was early in the season and that there’s time to fine-tune his technique, and knowing that it’s his first year in the B group (age 14-15), provided some comfort though.
“It doesn’t make me feel too self-conscious because I know that there are
older kids who do hard dives,” McKay outlines. “But it makes me feel happy when I get a good score.”
The major competitions local divers will work towards next are the July 11-13 Speedo Junior Development National Championships in Montreal and the Aug. 8-10 Speedo Junior Elite National Championships in Victoria.
Ottawa native 14th in NCAA finals
In Austin, TX, Sir Robert Borden High School and NODC grad Jamie Bissett of the Purdue Boilermakers earned Honorable Mention All-American status by placing 14th overall in the 3 m springboard event at the NCAA Diving Championships on March 28.
The third-year general health sciences (pre-med) student scored 386.40 points at the championships.