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Emma Falley Interview
TS: Hello, I’m here with Emma Falley and she is this week’s Midwest Conference Women’s
Swimming and Diving Performer of the Week. First of all, congratulations. This comes
after you had a very solid performance here at the Pioneer Classic. You swept both diving
events, both 3 and 1 meter. Talk a little bit about each one of those events and what
you were able to do to get the title in each one.
EF: It felt like a pretty stable meet. I didn’t have any dives that were outstanding. There
were a few dives afterwards where we talked about what I could work on. I felt pretty
consistent on both board. It is pretty hard to come back and compete the next day with
11 dives again, with so many divers and so much down time between the dives.
TS: So really it’s as much of a mental type of thing as physical. Most sports are, but
it sounds like really dealing with the down time.
EF: It really is, diving is sometimes more mental that it is physical.
TS: Coach Hurley was telling me today that you are doing technique-wise some different
things this year; talk a little bit about that.
EF: I have changed my hurdle this year; we changed it at the very end of last year after
conference. We’ve been building on that from the changes we did last year and changing
my back press as well. And changing some dives and positions.
TS: Now you’ve had the benefit of not only having a great diver as a coach, Coach Deidra
Freeman, who was an Olympic trials qualifier, but then you also had the fortune of competing
with Kelly Bruce last year, a former All-American. Talk about what those people were able to
do for you in terms of helping you with your diving.
EF: Having Kelly as a teammate was fantastic last year, coming in as a first year and not
knowing anyone at Grinnell in general she was great to have on the team as a friend
and as a competitor. I think that when you compete against people who are better than
you it makes you a better diver. Having Deidra as a coach is phenomenal, she’s great. We
do dry-land that I can really tell is working. Some of the ways that she coaches us, a lot
of things click better than they have in the past. It’s really improved my diving; she’s
a really fun coach.
TS: The thing I forgot to mention is not only did you have a great meet, but the team won
the meet, the Pioneer Classic, 1st of 11 teams. Talk about that, that’s pretty exciting.
EF: It was great, people had some really fast times this weekend. We saw a lot of really
fast swims from not only our upper-classmen but also really fast first years. It was phenomenal;
we had such a great energy going. When we found out we won the meet it was kind of the
cherry on top of everything, because people did really well personally, but to do well
as a team is even better.
TS: Now that you’ve gotten off to a really fast start this year, what are your goals
by the time the season is done?
EF: My goal is to get a Nat’s cut before conference comes around. We have another 11
dive opportunities, and we do that after our Florida training trip. It’d be great to
get that out of the way almost. I really would like to do better than I placed at conference
last year. I placed 5th at conference and it’d be awesome to move up in the placing.
TS: Alright well good luck, and this is Emma Falley she is the Midwest Conference Women’s
Swimming and Diving Performer of the Week, congratulations.
EF: Thank you.