SPRINGING AHEAD

Springboard divers are all-around athletes; the sport requires explosive power and flexibility, with strong legs, buttocks, abdominals and arms (needed when the diver impacts the water). Shaye trains eight hours a week in the pool practising dives, and seven hours in the gym where she does “100 sommies” — that’s 50 forward and 50 backward somersaults standing on a mat. And that’s just a warm-up. Springboard divers are scored on grace and technique. Judges consider the height and grace of a dive, the approach and the entry into the water (splash-free is the goal). Divers are raw-scored on their dive multiplied by the difficulty of the tricks. At top-level events, female divers usually do five dives, and their final score is from those five dives combined. Shaye competes in the onemetre, and three-metre series and her favourite dive is the back-two-and-a-half in the pike position.