GOLD AND BLACK ILLUSTRATED VOLUME 25, ISSUE 5 74
10-meter — 510, 514, 530, 532 —
and that's how they keep going in
practice, so it's nice to see it happen
in competition."
Soldati says Johnson's perfor-
mance stems from the work he put
in beforehand, from his international
work to his collegiate prep.
"Prior to Steele even coming,
there's no question he was a great,
great diver," Soldati said. "He pos-
sesses many of physical skills to
be at a very elite level in this sport.
Where you really wage war is in the
mind, being able to really get your-
self in a position to have those key
performances when you want. …
When he gets out in front and real-
ly gets rolling, he can attack. Some-
times where the questions come in is
when there's a little bit of a fumble
or a mistake, then the mental battle
begins to happen. So one thing we've
really worked on is trying to not hold
on to the results, not be focused on
that, because when ev-
erything is rolling great,
then it's great. But as
soon as something be-
gins to flip, then panic
and anxiety comes in.
"We got a little closer
to that at NCAA, where
he would come over and
I could see the anxiety
start to build a little bit.
And I'd say 'OK, we just need to relax a
little bit. You know how to execute the
dive.' That's where the battle is won."
Johnson will have many more bat-
tles soon. He'll partner with Boudia on
the international scene in the coming
months, as the two continue toward
the '16 Olympics. And he has several
other international competitions slat-
ed individually in coming months.
But next year could be even busier.
At some point, Johnson will have
to decide whether he competes col-
legiately next season, or focuses on
preparation for the Olympics. Doing
both, at least full time, is probably out
of the question, due to the overlap-
ping of events on the schedule.
"There's a lot of different roads
that we can go down, but we can't re-
ally evaluate that until after the World
Championships," Soldati said of the
event, for which Johnson and Boudia
will compete, in Kazan, Russia July
24-Aug. 9. "But regardless of what
road we go down, it's going to be busy
and high stress. But that's just part of
the game."
j
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Trent Johnson, Agent
