“I’M EXCITED TO leave,” smiles diver Tanya Watson. The Southampton native will jet off with Oliver Dingley and coach Damian Ball next week to represent Ireland at the Tokyo Olympics.
Watson hasn’t been stuck at home for too long, mind: it was only May when she scored 271.85 in the preliminary round of the 10m platform at the FINA Diving World Cup — in the Olympics’ host city, no less — to become the first ever female Irish diver to qualify for the Games.
It’s a feat which has taken some time to register with the 19-year-old but then, the dust is only now beginning to settle on a whirlwind 18 months which have culminated in something tangible to look forward to, at last.
“I’m quite excited, also a bit nervous I think because it’s my first Olympic Games. And yeah… It did take a while to sink in when I knew I’d qualified. I think all my friends and family, it sinks in for them a lot quicker than it did for me”, she says, “if that makes sense.”
Giorgio Perottino / INPHO
Giorgio Perottino / INPHO / INPHO
In March 2020, more so than most of us, Watson suddenly found herself trying to make sense of everything, or anything. Her A Levels in school were cancelled and she found herself unable to train four months out from the originally scheduled Games for which she was yet to qualify. “My plans changed…or they moved,” she says.
Watson, who practiced gymnastics between the ages of four and eight before focusing on diving, bought a blow-up mat and trained in her garden, “so that I could at least do some somersaults — that’s the next best thing”. She did that throughout the first UK-wide lockdown while the doors of the Southampton Diving Academy remained closed and while the in-person expertise of her coach, two-time British Olympian Lindsey Fraser, was consequently rendered moot.
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While without a pool in which to train, Watson made her way over to Dublin a couple of times in the latter half of last year, spending most of July and August, and also three weeks in October, at the National Sports Campus in Abbotstown. During both trips, she had to self-isolate for a fortnight upon arrival in Ireland, although on her October visit she was at least allowed to train provided she “stayed away from everybody for the two weeks”.
A third visit to Ireland in January of this year, however, turned into a four-and-a-half month stay, “which I did not expect to happen,” she says.
“Luckily I was living with a couple of swimmers and a diver named Clare [Ryan] and that really helped me,” Watson says.
But I did really struggle about two months into my stay: by around March, I was getting really homesick. It’s one thing being in Dublin normally, but then being in Dublin when I can’t meet new people and I can’t go and explore the lovely scenery around me because of the travel limits that were in place…
“I really respected all the rules — I felt really safe. But I think emotionally, it was really hard because I didn’t necessarily have that emotional support where people were actually with me physically. Obviously, I could call my parents and my friends as much as I liked and they were all great; people were always at the end of the phone. It was just really hard being away from my family and friends and I did have a few dips where I had to pull myself back up again and almost have a new focus.
I just had to take it day by day rather than looking at how many months before I could see my family.
By the time she got home to Southampton in May, Watson had a new nephew whom she was yet to meet, as well as her niece whom she hadn’t seen in months. “Those were the two people I missed the most,” says the teenager.
Giorgio Perottino / INPHO
Giorgio Perottino / INPHO / INPHO
Watson qualifies to represent Ireland through her maternal grandmother, a native of Derry who moved to London circa 1960, about a year before she had Watson’s mother.
“I’m really sad that she can’t see me represent Ireland today,” Watson says. “I’m really excited for the opportunity and I really wish she could see it.
“I’m the youngest of four by about eight years so I didn’t really know her very well. When I was growing up, she was, I guess, slowly…she was getting old and she didn’t really talk as much about her past as I was growing up.
“I knew I had Irish heritage but I’ve learned a lot more about that as I’ve grown older because my mum told me more about it.”
That ancestral link is something she shares in common with team-mate and fellow Tokyo Olympian Oliver Dingley, the Yorkshireman who represented Ireland at Rio 2016 through his paternal grandmother from Cork.
And Dingley, who at Rio became Ireland’s first Olympic diver in 68 years and finished an impressive eighth, is well placed to prime Watson for the summer to come.
Watson, Ciara McGing and Oliver Dingley watching team-mate Clare Ryan during the World Cup in Tokyo. Naoki Nishimura / INPHO
Naoki Nishimura / INPHO / INPHO
“Ollie is always talking about the Olympics,” Watson laughs. “The environment, the spectators — obviously there’ll be less this time. He talks about all the kit, the merchandise; he just always gets excited when he talks about it so I guess he’s just given me the idea that the Olympics is something to enjoy, soak in, and be excited about when you’re there.”
Watson will soon attend Oxford University at which point she will have to assess whether or not she can spin plates between her diving and her studies.
So, Dingley’s advice carries extra weight ahead of Tokyo which could prove to be, by a choice, a literally once-in-a-lifetime experience for a talented diver but an equally driven academic.
“I want to take it all in,” Watson says. “I really want to make the Olympic final and I want to make sure that I have consistent diving and that I don’t hold back.”
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No holding back for 19-year-old Tanya Watson ahead of Tokyo return
“I’M EXCITED TO leave,” smiles diver Tanya Watson. The Southampton native will jet off with Oliver Dingley and coach Damian Ball next week to represent Ireland at the Tokyo Olympics.
Watson hasn’t been stuck at home for too long, mind: it was only May when she scored 271.85 in the preliminary round of the 10m platform at the FINA Diving World Cup — in the Olympics’ host city, no less — to become the first ever female Irish diver to qualify for the Games.
It’s a feat which has taken some time to register with the 19-year-old but then, the dust is only now beginning to settle on a whirlwind 18 months which have culminated in something tangible to look forward to, at last.
“I’m quite excited, also a bit nervous I think because it’s my first Olympic Games. And yeah… It did take a while to sink in when I knew I’d qualified. I think all my friends and family, it sinks in for them a lot quicker than it did for me”, she says, “if that makes sense.”
In March 2020, more so than most of us, Watson suddenly found herself trying to make sense of everything, or anything. Her A Levels in school were cancelled and she found herself unable to train four months out from the originally scheduled Games for which she was yet to qualify. “My plans changed…or they moved,” she says.
Watson, who practiced gymnastics between the ages of four and eight before focusing on diving, bought a blow-up mat and trained in her garden, “so that I could at least do some somersaults — that’s the next best thing”. She did that throughout the first UK-wide lockdown while the doors of the Southampton Diving Academy remained closed and while the in-person expertise of her coach, two-time British Olympian Lindsey Fraser, was consequently rendered moot.
While without a pool in which to train, Watson made her way over to Dublin a couple of times in the latter half of last year, spending most of July and August, and also three weeks in October, at the National Sports Campus in Abbotstown. During both trips, she had to self-isolate for a fortnight upon arrival in Ireland, although on her October visit she was at least allowed to train provided she “stayed away from everybody for the two weeks”.
A third visit to Ireland in January of this year, however, turned into a four-and-a-half month stay, “which I did not expect to happen,” she says.
“Luckily I was living with a couple of swimmers and a diver named Clare [Ryan] and that really helped me,” Watson says.
“I really respected all the rules — I felt really safe. But I think emotionally, it was really hard because I didn’t necessarily have that emotional support where people were actually with me physically. Obviously, I could call my parents and my friends as much as I liked and they were all great; people were always at the end of the phone. It was just really hard being away from my family and friends and I did have a few dips where I had to pull myself back up again and almost have a new focus.
By the time she got home to Southampton in May, Watson had a new nephew whom she was yet to meet, as well as her niece whom she hadn’t seen in months. “Those were the two people I missed the most,” says the teenager.
Watson qualifies to represent Ireland through her maternal grandmother, a native of Derry who moved to London circa 1960, about a year before she had Watson’s mother.
“I’m really sad that she can’t see me represent Ireland today,” Watson says. “I’m really excited for the opportunity and I really wish she could see it.
“I’m the youngest of four by about eight years so I didn’t really know her very well. When I was growing up, she was, I guess, slowly…she was getting old and she didn’t really talk as much about her past as I was growing up.
“I knew I had Irish heritage but I’ve learned a lot more about that as I’ve grown older because my mum told me more about it.”
That ancestral link is something she shares in common with team-mate and fellow Tokyo Olympian Oliver Dingley, the Yorkshireman who represented Ireland at Rio 2016 through his paternal grandmother from Cork.
And Dingley, who at Rio became Ireland’s first Olympic diver in 68 years and finished an impressive eighth, is well placed to prime Watson for the summer to come.
“Ollie is always talking about the Olympics,” Watson laughs. “The environment, the spectators — obviously there’ll be less this time. He talks about all the kit, the merchandise; he just always gets excited when he talks about it so I guess he’s just given me the idea that the Olympics is something to enjoy, soak in, and be excited about when you’re there.”
Watson will soon attend Oxford University at which point she will have to assess whether or not she can spin plates between her diving and her studies.
So, Dingley’s advice carries extra weight ahead of Tokyo which could prove to be, by a choice, a literally once-in-a-lifetime experience for a talented diver but an equally driven academic.
“I want to take it all in,” Watson says. “I really want to make the Olympic final and I want to make sure that I have consistent diving and that I don’t hold back.”
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