Len Hodge Practises His Diving In Winter

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28302, 13 June 1957, Page 9

Len Hodge Practises His Diving In Winter

“F Christchurch had a tepid, covered swimming pool with one-metre and three-metre spring diving boards, which could be used during the winter season, Len could make a serious attempt to represent New Zealand in the diving events at the 1958 Empire Games in Cardiff,” said Mr L. Hodge, father of Len Hodge, the present national intermediate springboard champion, recently. Although Len Hodge cannot train seriously in the winter, he has found a way to retain some of his agility in diving movements which he perfects in the summer Season. St. Andrew’s College has a well-equipped gymnasium and because Hodge is a pupil he is allowed to use it at certain times. Among the usual equipment to be found there is a wooden springboard, not quite one metre high. Hodge says that this makes little difference, and he can perform acrobatics ranging from a back somersault to a forward somersault with a full twist. Naturally he cannot carry out a dive and complete the many other complicated movements which he does over water in the Centennial Pool.

Rubber Mats

When training at the gymnasium, Hodge usually lands on his feet. To protect himself from an injury that could occur from the jarring received when he lands, he places about 10 rubber mats at the end of the springboard. He admits that once or twice he has become lost executing an acrobatic manoeuvre with a twist in it, and landed on his neck. He says that he has never really hurt himself.

“If you hit the water on your side or back from a one metre springboard, it will hurt far more,” he said.

Because Len Hodge is sitting for the School Certificate examination this year, he finds that most of his spare time to practise on the springboard occurs in the school lunch hour, and on Friday evenings. In one week he puts in about six hours’ training on

the gym springboard. In the slimmer his total hours of training amount to about 24 a week. Len Hodge’s interest in diving was first aroused when his father took him to the old municipal swimming pool in Manchester street to see an exhibition of diving by the 1948 Olympic Games diving champions, Dr. Sammy Lee and Mrs Pat McCormick.

In 1952, when Len was aged 10, he won his first national diving championship. He was then competing against boys of about 17 years. For the next four years he again won national titles. He is the only person to have had his name on the Benson Cup, presented to the junior national diving cham-

pion, more than three times. Len Hodge still has another two seassons to go in the intermediate grade. This season he intends to compete in both the senior and intermediate national diving championships. The hardest dive which Hodge has so far attempted is a two and a halt somersaults. He began the 1956 summer season by executing a one and a half somer-

saults with a full twist. By the end of the season he was able to do a one and a half somersaults with a double twist, one of the hardest dives known. Mr Hodge said that Len would try to represent New Zealand at the 1960 Olympic Games to be held in Rome.