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Welcome to the Ilda Clippers Dive Team!
We strive to provide a fun, healthy, competitive, and family-friendly atmosphere for our team. From beginner to advanced, your diver will be given the opportunity to learn and improve their skills. We encourage all participants to do their best and have fun! To register for the 2013 Ilda Community Dive Team, print our registration form and mail it/drop off at 8900 Braeburn Drive Annandale, or bring it to Ilda Pool Open House, May 11, 2013
For the summer of 2013, the dive team representatives will once again be Genny Sarratt and Jim Murray. They can be contacted at gsarratt@yahoo.com and jjmurray@yahoo.com.
2013 News
Season hasn't started yet, but when it does, the latest news will be posted here.
Meet Notes for 2012
Dive Divisionals
Ilda had a fantastic meet at Divisionals with four divers making All Stars - Kate Summers, Tommy Dunn, Mary Parker, and Ross Rubin and three All Star alternates - Ava Dunn, Mark Murray, and Matt Parker. Only one other team from our division had as many All Stars, and we had the most alternates. What an incredible showing for Ilda!
A Meet 5 vs Woodley
WOW, what a great meet for Ilda!!! When we were checking out Woodley's scores for the season, it was looking like this was going to be our toughest meet. So, for us to come out with a win was AMAZING! Final score was Ilda 37, Woodley 34. In this close meet, if even one of our 1st places had been a 1st for Woodley, it would have tipped the score in Woodley's favor. What a terrific example of how important every single point is to the team.
Special recognition goes to:
- Freshman Girl, Ava Dunn, whose scores have improved in every single A meet.
- Intermediate Girl, Dori Lichter, whose scores have also improved in every single A meet.
- Intermediate Boy, Ross Rubin, as highest point scorer for the team with four 1st places and one 2nd place for the season.
- ALL Intermediate Girls and Boys for a complete sweep of Intermediates in our last meet of the season.
A Meet 4 vs Ravensworth
Fun meet last night at Ravenwsorth. Those Ravens senior boys sure have a good time. Ravensworth has some really strong divers, so we were facing a major challenge going into the meet. Although they out-matched us overall, we did place in every age group we had divers. Final score was Ravensworth 40, Ilda 27.
What we most want to see throughout the season is for our divers to continually improve -- one indicator being continually increasing individual scores. What a great night for Ilda with so many personal bests. Congratulations to the following divers who achieved personal best scores for the season last night:
Olivia DeCarlo (FG)
Ava Dunn (FG)
Hamel Haile (FG)
Nuhamin Haile (FG)
Kate Summers (FG)
Mark Murray (JB)
Ryan Sarratt (JB)
Dori Lichter (IG)
Nicholas Summers (IB)
That's personal bests for half the divers who dove for us last night!
A Meet 3 vs Orange Hunt
How nice to be able to add one to the win column! Orange Hunt and Ilda both have small, developing teams with holes in some age groups. However, we matched up well in this meet against the friendly team from Orange Hunt. Final score was Ilda 40, Orange Hunt 31.
Special recognition goes to:
- Freshman Girl, Hamel Haile, who did great in her first A meet.
- Freshman Girl, Nuhamin Haile, who also dove in her first A meet. She still needs help with the back fall-in, but impressed us all by doing a front flip this week, and her best yet in the meet.
- Freshman Girl, Kate Bryan, who is progressing very quickly -- now doing a forward dive, instead of a front entry and a front flip, instead of a jump. She got yet another consecutive personal best, improving on her previous best by 13.35 points.
- Freshman Girl, Ava Dunn, who improved on her previous best by 11.9 points.
- Freshman Boy, Forrest Nottingham, who has progressed to doing a back dive, instead of a back entry and forward dive 1/2 twist instead of a jump. He also saw a 10+ point improvement in score.
- Intermediate Boy, Nicholas Summers, who decided to join the Dive Team this week, and even dove up in Seniors after learning his 6th dive just before the meet...all to be able to gain a point for the team in the meet. A BIG thank you to Nicholas!
A Meet 2 vs Greenbriar
We were fortunate to get our meet in as scheduled. Some pools are still suffering after last Friday's storm. It was a close meet but we came up short. Final score was Greenbriar 38, Ilda 31. Greenbriar had a real standout diver, Intermediate Boy, Samson Miller, who had just returned from competing in a National Junior Olympic dive meet. It's always a treat to see Olympic hopeful divers in action.
Special recognition goes to:
- Freshman, Caroline Smith, who made it onto the podium for the first time in an A Meet, earning herself a white ribbon.
- Freshman, Kate Bryan, and Intermediates, Tim and Matt Parker, who have dove in all 3 meets so far and steadily improved their scores each meet.
- Intermediate, Mary Parker, who made it onto the record board for current year high score in Intermediate Girls.
- Junior, Ryan Sarratt, who after 4 years of trying, has finally gotten the forward flip...proof that one should never give up.
B Meet 1 vs Wakefield Chapel
The B Meet with Wakefield Chapel was a great success! With most WC families and many Ilda families attending Wakefield Forest Elem School, it is always fun to see familiar faces in friendly summer competition. Having the pool remain open did not seem to impact the running of the meet. I liked that the pool was so lively-looking, yet everyone still stopped and noticed when Eriko Murray as always, delighted us with her powerful, inspiring rendition of the National Anthem. The audience also seemed to be one of the largest we've ever had at a dive meet.
It was wonderful to see our divers, who are still working on getting their required dives, be able to compete on Thu. Hamel and Nuhamin Haile looked very confident this second year diving. Yule Park did great in his first ever dive meet. And of course, special recognition goes to our youngest ever diver -- 3-year-old Elizabeth Bryan, who stole everyone's hearts. Her oh-so-cool front jump, stepping off the board with a mischievous look towards the judges was adorable!
A Meet 1 vs Highland Park
How nice to have pleasantly cool weather for our first dive meet of the season. Ilda's small contigent of 17 divers came up short against Highland Park's maximum contingent of 32 divers. Considering HP's very large team of over 50 divers total, Ilda had a respectable finish, placing in every age group. Final score Ilda (30) vs. Highland Park (41).
Special recognition goes to:
- Freshman divers, Kate Bryan and Eric Blanchard, who dove in their first Ilda A Meet after mastering the Back Entry Dive without assistance this week.
- Intermediate diver, Tim Parker, who dove in his first ever dive meet.
- Senior diver, Gregory Traversa, whose family moved out of the neighborhood last year, but has come back after a season off just to dive for Ilda.
Many thanks to all who helped with the running of the meet, concessions, and food donations. Everyone's assistance is greatly appreciated. We turn around and do this again on Thu 6/28 for our B Meet, and then get a week off from hosting.
Ilda Dive Team 2012 Schedule/Results
| Date | Day | Time | Event | Opponent | Location/Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| June 26 | Tuesday | 6:00 PM | A Meet | Highland Park | HP 41, Ilda 30 |
| June 28 | Thursday | 6:00 PM | B Meet | Wakefield Chapel | Ilda |
| July 3 | Tuesday | 6:00 PM | A Meet | Greenbriar | Greenbriar 38, Ilda 31 |
| July 10 | Tuesday | 6:00 PM | A Meet | Orange Hunt | Ilda 40, OH 31 |
| July 12 | Thursday | 6:00 PM | B Meet | Mantua | Mantua |
| July 15 | Sunday | 8:00 AM | Wally Martin 3M | Oak Marr | |
| July 17 | Tuesday | 6:00 PM | A Meet | Ravensworth | Ravensworth 40, Ilda 27 |
| July 19 | Thursday | 6:00 PM | B Meet | Truro | Truro |
| July 24 | Tuesday | 6:00 PM | A Meet | Woodley | Ilda 37, Woodley 34 |
| July 28 | Saturday | 5:00 PM | Banquet | Ilda | |
| July 29 | Sunday | 8:00 AM | Divisionals | Division 6 | Greenbriar |
| August 5 | Sunday | 8:00 AM | All Stars | Lee Graham |
Ilda Dive Team Practice Times (2012)
From May 29 until June 22* (Mon-Fri), practice times are:
4:00 to 5:00 PM -- age 9 and over
5:00 to 6:00 PM -- age 8 and under
Age 13 and older may also practice in the 5:00 hour.
June 25* morning practices start (Mon-Fri):
9:00 to 10:00 AM -- 11 and over
10:00 to 11:00 AM -- 10 and under
* Week of June 18-22 Dive Team continues with PM practice, whereas Swim Team switches to AM practice.
Dive Team Coaches
Our Head Dive Coach is Nick Guttendorf and Assistant Dive Coach is Samantha Eldridge, both of whom hail from Woodson High School. Nick was a 2010 Woodson HS graduate, where he was a 4-year Varsity letterman in diving, was named Captain and MVP his senior year, and qualified for All-American. He was also a member of the Truro Dive Team, where he was instrumental in 6 of the team's first place titles (2005-2010) in NVSL Division 1. ln addition, he was an assistant coach at Truro for 4 years. Nick is finishing his sophomore year at GMU, where he had another successful season on their Division 1 dive team.
Samantha is a graduating Senior at Woodson, and has lettered all 4 years on the Woodson Varsity Dive Team. She was Captain this past year and had an impressive dive season, qualifying for Regionals in the 2nd meet of the season.
Dive Team Links
The links below are for sites that dive team members might find helpful.
NVSL Diving - official web site of the Northern Virginia Swim League Diving.
Mason Dive Academy - Dive club that several Clippers have dove with during the school year.
Dominion Dive Club - Dive club that several Clippers have dove with during the school year.
Alexandria Dive Club - Dive club that several Clippers have dove with during the school year.
Woodson Swim and Dive - local high school swim and dive team that several Clippers swim for during the school year.