On the surface, diving and football seem like polar opposite sports, but taking a look at their away-game schedules reveals some similarities.
Offensive lineman Cash Hardy `28 said that the football team usually wakes up around 8:00 a.m. if they spend the night at a hotel. “Walk-through is at 8:10, which is like a rough practice outline,” Hardy said. “We usually do it in the parking lot because most of the hotels that we stay at won’t have a conference room.”
After walk-through ends at around 8:45 a.m., Hardy said the team is sent to pack their things from the hotel room before heading to breakfast around 9:15 a.m. Then, he said, the next steps depend on how far away from breakfast the game is. “Sometimes the games are close to breakfast and sometimes they’re like an hour and a half away,” Hardy said. “That can be interesting because the timing is weird, like when you eat again or if you take a nap. Whatever you do pre-game, it’s an interesting time frame.”
The team generally arrives around 11:00 a.m. at the latest, Hardy said, with kick-off starting at 1:00 p.m. In between arrival and kick-off is team warmups. “Most people get ready, do whatever they do. It takes a lot of time to put on your pads and stuff, but I like to go do a lap around the field, walk through my footwork and stuff on the turf because every place we play has a different field surface,” he said. “It’s nice to get a feel for what you’re going to play on.”
After every game, the team gets pizza. “Games always end at roughly 4,” he said. “If we end early we get it at 4, if it ends on time then we get it at 5.” That is the last sponsored meal of the day, but many of the athletes on the team seem to be unsatisfied with this, Hardy said.
“Most of the time, based on how the bus driver breaks work, we have to take a stop somewhere. We usually stop at a gas station, and because we don’t have any kind of stipend program, we usually have to just go buy our own stuff,” he said. “Usually the gas station is where people will get their electrolytes. I usually get an apple and electrolytes.”
“I’m not the biggest fan of the eating system,” Hardy said.
Diver Alex Kruse `29 said that generally the swim team leaves early in the morning with a catered breakfast from the dining hall and a packed sandwich for lunch. “Usually breakfast is like bagels, yogurt, stuff like that, and we bring along a bunch of sandwiches for lunch,” she said. “But diving is at a really unfortunate time because it’s right during lunch, so you have to either eat before and throw up or eat after and starve. It’s rough.”
“Usually we are leaving sometime between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m., and our competitions often don’t start on time, but we would usually be either warming up or arriving between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m,” said Kruse.
The diving team competes between 12:00 p.m. and 3:00 p.m. and concludes between 3:00 p.m. and 6:00 p.m., Kruse said.
“Sometimes the divers are done and we get to wait for the swimmers to be done,” she said. “Then we get to cheer on our teammates.”
The day of a diver ends the same way the day of the football team does. “After the meets, we usually get pizza,” said Kruse.