On Oct. 2, the University of Denver women’s swimming and diving team made its mark, setting the tone in its first intrasquad home meet of the season. Redshirt senior Zora Opalka (Bainbridge Island, Wash.), a notable diver on the team, participated in the 3m women’s dive, coming first in the championship. Both Opalka and fellow diver Maya Belanger (San Diego, Calif.) broke the current 1m record with their scores.
Opalka started diving at a small recreational program near Seattle, Wash. and was recruited there to be part of the class of 2021. COVID-19 made training harder, and due to her Slovak citizenship, she took last year off to train internationally and compete for her national team in Slovakia. This experience allowed her to compete back in the NCAA this year for the first time since the 2018-19 season.
In preparation for her most recent competition, she mentioned that she treated it “like a benchmark.” Since it was her first performance back in the NCAA since pre-COVID-19, she was ecstatic to see herself perform so well and have the younger teammates step up to the plate as well. “The people in the diving community are so supportive, the sport is such a small world and is like a family,” Opalka said.
She thinks this is certainly the strongest the DU diving program has ever been and this competition helped to validate the hard work the team has been putting in since the sporadic shutdowns.
When asked about how she prepared, Opalka said she did a lot of “meditation, stretching, mindfulness practice, and higher-intensity dives during the week going in.” The team also utilized the weight room to prepare because they can only improve from such training.
She mentioned her appreciation for coach Aaron Daddario, who has helped the diving program greatly and will continue to do so in the future.
“The divers have been working hard the past few weeks and today (Oct. 2) they showed that hard work pays off. Performers this consistent at the start of the season makes me so excited to see them develop and improve throughout this year,” Daddario said.
In terms of what challenges she came across, Zora Opalka explained that they “usually lie internally. Diving is high stress and high risk. When you mess up from such high heights, the consequences are physically dangerous but also mentally taxing.” Diving is challenging and takes physical as well as mental skills to achieve success in a competition.
In the future, once the team is able to start working in full force a little deeper in the season, Opalka hopes to break the 3m record and leave a lasting impact on the program, in addition to being the first platform diver in DU’s history. Internationally, she hopes to continue to leave behind a legacy for Team Slovakia and be the first Slovak Olympic diver ever in the 2024 Olympic Games.
“The team culture at DU breeds excellence at the highest levels. We are so lucky to have our coach Aaron Daddario and I can’t wait to see what we accomplish this year,” Opalka said.
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