Plunging Into the Next Level : Nadadores’ Brown Has Tools to Compete Internationally

She’s bringing new meaning to the words “lady in waiting.”

If she’s not in line for a turn on the three-meter board, she’s having to wait in any number of lines at the passport office.

Such was the lesson diver Summer Brown learned during a rare day off in the midst of the busy diving season. Maneuvering a difficult trick from the tower is a breeze compared to the hoops one must jump through to visit another country.

“I just waited in one line for 35 minutes, now there’s a two-hour wait in another one,” Brown said with a shrug.

After the Mission Viejo Nadadores’ standout won the National Junior Olympic girls’ 16-18 three-meter championship at the Rose Bowl Aquatics Center on Sunday, Brown had some unfinished business on Monday.

Seems the Capistrano Valley High junior figured she wouldn’t place high enough--first or second--to qualify for the junior world championships Aug. 18-22 in England, and thus hadn’t bothered to apply for a passport.

“I can have good meets, but I can have bad meets, too,” said Brown, whose second-place finish in the one-meter also qualified her to make the trip to London. “I didn’t think I’d make it.”

Nadadores Coach Janet Ely-Lagourgue is charmed by Brown’s ability to keep a balanced perspective, to take victory and defeat in stride.

“No matter what the outcome, she handles herself like a champion,” Ely-Lagourgue said. “She can get frustrated and angry, but she can put it in a place that won’t hurt her, where she can deal with it later. She has exceptional emotional control.”

Rather than think about the next meet she has to qualify for, Brown, 16, thinks about how she can improve on the next dive.

“She’s good about not putting the cart before the horse. She likes to do things sequentially,” Ely-Lagourgue said.

At the U.S. Olympic Festival two weeks ago, Brown’s fifth-place finish in the three-meter was the highest showing by a Nadadores diver. She is, according to her coach, “on a roll.”

Brown hopes to keep the momentum going with her performance at the Senior Nationals, which begin today at USC, then gain momentum going into the international meet in Europe.

“I’ve never competed against the Russians or the Chinese,” Brown said. “Everyone says they’re really great.”

Which was something she never figured she’d become in diving.

In 1988, Brown ended a nine-year love-hate relationship with gymnastics--she reached the highest elite level--when she was finally pushed too hard and shoved back. She and her older sister, Shannon, quit the gym and went knocking on Mission Viejo’s door.

“It was so stressful,” she recalled. “I was too young and being pushed too hard. After I quit, I took a couple of months off, but I wanted something to keep me busy.”

Five years later, she sounds amazed that she is among the nation’s foremost female divers.

“I never thought I’d get the chance to dive internationally,” she said.

But from the moment Brown took her first walk on a springboard, Ely-Lagourgue, a two-time Olympian, knew she had potential.

“I’m a gymnast-turned-diver,” she said. “I could tell if she liked it, she could be very good. What it came down to was what kind of a person is she, what kind of drive does she have?”

Considerable, it turns out. Ely-Lagourgue won’t peg Brown as a future Olympian--”She can reach the higher level, but I’m very careful about expectations,” she said--but admitted that Brown has all the tools it takes to reach the top.

“Patience, persistence, tolerance, discipline, determination, a strong work ethic, a strong family background,” she said. “Summer has a clear understanding that what we ask of her is in her best interest. And she makes no excuses.”

Case in point: Brown could have sat out a good portion of the season because of a severe sinus condition that made it extremely painful to dive from any board. But rather than skip practice, Brown showed up every day and did board work and dry land exercises.

“When she could get back in the water, she didn’t have much catching up to do,” Ely-Lagourgue said. “That shows you what kind of an athlete she is.”

There are other Nadadores who win more meets and get more headlines--road-trip roommate and close friend Sandy Zubrin for one--but Brown has distinguished herself by using a three-meter dive list that few, if any, competitors can match.

Brown increases her degree of difficulty not by spinning around more times than her peers but by diving with her body aligned in ways others can’t match. Most will execute a back 2 1/2 or reverse 2 1/2 in the more common tuck position, while Brown will do them from the more difficult pike.

“There may be some (girls) who do some of those dives, but not at the level or as consistently as Summer does them,” Ely-Lagourgue said.

The Nadadores coaching staff is working with Brown on two more tricks, an inward 2 1/2 pike and a front 3 1/2, dives that would catapult her into the international level. But they are tucked away until she nails them as consistently as the rest of her list.

“A lot of people can’t spin very fast. I have this way of whipping myself around,” she said.

There are more graceful divers, ones with more finesse. But few of Brown’s peers have her pure power and athleticism.

“Summer’s more the athlete, Sandy’s more the artist,” Ely-Lagourgue said. “But Summer’s a beautiful diver. She has a different kind of beauty. She’s beginning to see her special characteristics.”

One characteristic Brown wants to add to her repertoire is the ability to “rip” a dive, or enter the water with complete calm. This fine point of diving is a quality Brown has yet to achieve, which is still a mystery to her.

“I don’t know, for some reason I just haven’t done it yet,” she said.

Ely-Lagourgue said it’s just a matter of time: “She’s getting there. She’s discovering the rip line and what it takes to get there.”

* KEEPING PERSPECTIVE: A key to the success of Mary Ellen Clark is that she doesn’t let one bad dive affect subsequent ones. C2