By Jordyn Vella
Since the age of five, Lauren Berardi has been fascinated with swimming. Her family used to call her a fish because she would never leave the water.
With a heavy schedule senior year of AP classes, and the stresses of applying to college, Berardi has managed to focus and pursue her love for swimming.
“Swimming has always been my way of releasing stress, when I am focusing on swim, I forget about all the other stressors happening in my life,” she says with a confident tone in her voice.
Berardi started swim freshman year looking for a way to make friends, and get a better technique with the sport she already loved. While she was talking, it was clear that the community of swim has made her life happier.
“I have made real, life long friends that are kind, and make me feel comfortable being myself”.
Berardi loved being on the swim team, it was everything and even more than what she expected. She was able to pursue a desire to continue swimming through her highschool career. Or so she thought, Berardi started to want to try different things revolving the water.
“I would be at swim practice and I started to find myself watching the people across the whole pool… the divers. The way they jumped off the diving board and did flips into the pool was way more intriguing to me than swim”, she says with her eyes wide open.
She soon realised that swimming is not what she wanted to pursue, and that dive was actually more intriguing to her. At the end of freshman year, she realised what she wanted to do for the next couple of seasons of swim and dive. Berardi strikingly stated that she will always love swimming, but that diving makes her feel more connected to the water.
“When I first jumped off the board freshman year, I knew that dive was what I wanted to do. It was freeing, and was the closest feeling I will ever get to flying”.
As she changed from sitting criss-cross to putting her right leg over her left, she explained just exactly how hard and time committing dive was. Berardi has been full time babysitting on her off days of dive, and even having to stay after school some days to get extra help. Because of her persiant attitude of never giving up, she somehow always manages her time, and is always at school and dive practice without any whining. She had a contorted face while trying to explain all the different types of dives, as she all of a sudden got excited, and basically screamed how the 103C dive is her favorite. Her excitement for the sport beams through her face when she talks about it.
“It was a lot of hard work to get started, but it was so worth it. My teammates are very supportive, and there is basically no competition between us divers”.
To compete in the competition one must know how to perform six different types of dives. When Berardi first started out sophomore year, she did not know how to do most dives like everyone else. She shyly admitted how frustrating it was to be so behind from everyone else at first.
“I have felt defeated, once I hit my leg against the diving board, and I then was not able to compete for 2 whole weeks. Although it was painful and aggravating, I got stronger and better because of that. I even went to practice when I was hurt, because I wanted to observe the other divers, and get some tips on how to be a better diver myself”.
Berardi gushes when I asked about the meets that she is most proud about for dive. She explains that every meet is different, in the way where you never know how you will compete.
“After I complete a dive that I feel confident in, I get very hyped up and proud of myself. Some days I have very bad dives, but not only is it embarrassing to mess up in front of everyone, when I smack my body against the water… it hurts more than anything”.
Swimming and diving is a big part of Berardi’s life. From the second we sat down to talk about her passion for the sport, she was excited to share her thoughts, and hopefully get some more people to try and do swim and dive. Lauren Berardi is great student athlete who strives to excel in both sports and academics.
