88 ILLUSTRATED VOLUME 25, ISSUE 3
f
BY KYLE CHARTERS
KCharters@GoldandBlack.com
D
avid Boudia only wanted to go home.
It was 2006, or thereabouts, and the 16-year-old
had already put in eight-plus hours at the pool and was
ready to get out of there. Only one hold up: He had to
wait as Steele Johnson, six years his junior, overcame
his nerves enough to take a plunge off the tower, 10
meters above the pool. They couldn't leave until
Johnson jumped, per coach's orders, and he
kept stalling.
So Boudia gave him an assist, or at least
that's the way he saw it then, barricading the
exit door from the platform to force Johnson
to take the only other way down.
The terrifying way.
The hit-the-water-at-33-mph way.
"It is really high and a 10-year-
old should not be doing
10-meter, but I was," said
the now 18-year-old
Johnson, as he com-
petes in his first sea-
son as a Boilermaker
diver. "He just locked
the door shut and
said 'You're not
coming down until
you do the dive.' So
it worked. I did the
dive and we got to go
home."
And a relationship
was born. Back then, Boud- i a
took on the role of an older broth-
er — and chauffeur — picking
up Johnson, along with current
Purdue junior Mary Beth Dun-
nichay, at about 6:30 a.m. on
weekdays on Indianapolis' north
side to get them downtown to the USA diving center an
hour later. There, they'd put in their "work day," before
Boudia drove them back in the evening.
The relationship now has morphed into a partner-
ship, as the Boilermakers are likely to compete togeth-
er in the 10-meter synchronized platform event at the
2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. The two have
competed together a couple times already, including
earning the bronze at the FINA Diving World
Cup in China last summer.
It's a strong bond.
"I've never had
a real brother,"
said Boudia, a
gold medalist
in the individ-
ual platform in
the 2012 London
Games, where he
also finished
S W I M M I N G A N D D I V I N G F E A T U R E : D A V I D B O U D I A A N D S T E E L E J O H N S O N
USA Diving
The shared backgrounds of Steele Johnson and David Boudia have helped them to
early synchronized success; the duo finished with bronze at the FINA Diving World Cup
in China in July.
Golden Partnership?
Boilermaker divers' relationship could equal big-time success
