As the 2023-2024 CHHS swim season begins, Clover Hill welcomes in their first diver, sophomore Mollie Bowers. Due to the Virginia High School League allowing diving to become a sport, Bowers has brought in a new benchmark to Clover Hills’ history.
Bowers mother enrolled her in swimming classes at the age of six with the idea that she could have fun making new friends. Due to Bowers long history of swimming, she decided to continue the sport into her high school years. As a freshman Bowers started swimming for Clover Hill, but in her sophomore year she decided to try something new. Bowers joined the CHHS dive team under the impression that the sport looked intriguing.
“I like swimming, doing flips, tumbling, and stuff and [diving] is a combination of both and it just sounded really fun,” Bowers said.
All of the schools in Chesterfield County with a diving team practice together in the same facility. Through this, Bowers is able to meet and create relationships with other divers from different schools.
“It’s like the same as it would be with other people [at other schools] because all the schools are combined so I just make friends with other schools,” Bowers said.
The divers practice at Dive RVA (Richmond, Virginia) where they meet with their coach who teaches all the Chesterfield high school divers.
“There’s a separate coach for the different districts so we have a separate coach for Chesterfield and Henrico,” Bowers said.
For being Bowers first year diving, she feels pretty comfortable where she is at in her learning and comprehension in the new materials that she receives.
“Some of the concepts are [more] difficult to understand than others but I think I’ve got it pretty good,” Bowers said.
Outside of her comfortability, there are still a few minor things that Bowers is still getting used to. As a beginner diver, Bowers has learned to overcome a minor setback of diving off the board. From this to other rigorous parts in diving, Bowers has been trying to get comfortable and familiar with the repetitive motions of diving.
“It’s really difficult because we have to have a specific thing or you’ll get points deducted, it’s just muscle memory,” Bowers said.
Through practice, Bowers hopes to make it to states and to be able to compete for a trophy. With the first swim meet of the 2023-2024 CHHS swim/dive season having been held on Nov. 28th, Bowers has completed six out of the 11 dives required to make it to states.
“Right now my goal is to get to states so I’m like 50 points off,” Bowers said.
For the foreseeable future, Bowers hopes to perfect her craft and make many more benchmarks for Clover Hill. As for now, Bowers hopes that more students at Clover Hill High School will find an interest in diving and consider joining the team in the future.
