High Stakes

We had a LONG day today!  It was fun though.  We got to UNLV pretty early, right at the beginning of warm-ups.  We were one of the first people in the parking lot, which made it a lot easier to park the motorhome!  I totally forgot to pack a towel for Stockton.  Whoops. After we got Stockton in the right place, I walked to CVS a few blocks away and bought a Las Vegas towel for him.  Preston was cute when we walked by the awards stand and wanted his picture taken.  Stockton walked by and said, "That's where I'm going to be."  He pointed at the 5th place spot.

Preston

Stockton's first competition was the 1 meter novice category.  The age range was 14-18 years old.  Some of these boys were huge!  They also were great divers!  Stockton did all of his dives very well. We also learned a lot.  For example, in the novice category you are required to do a front jump and a back jump.  Totally weird.  Stockton did a front jump pike.  He scored 5s on that.  A lot of the boys did a front jump straight.  They literally just jumped in the pool.  They scored 7s on that. We think the degree of difficulty might have been the same.  If Stockton ever dives in the novice category again, we are going to look at that more closely when registering.  Still, I'm glad we found away around diving on Sunday.  Also, notice Stockton got 5th place, just like he predicted.

Stockton, Mike and Preston went back to the motorhome while I stayed at the pool.  I texted Stockton when I thought his warm-ups for the 3 meter were starting.  I didn't understand that they split the group ahead of Stockton into two different groups.  I texted Stockton to come too early.  Only by an hour.  At least it is better early than late! Stockton did his dives really well on 3 meter.  This is the Junior Olympic category.  There were some amazing divers there!  So fun to watch!  We are not sure what place Stockton got because we hurried out of there as fast as we could, but he wasn't towards the top.  His degree of difficulty was not as high as a lot of the divers.  That's okay.  This was a great experience, and it is nice to know we have our travel meet done.  We might go to another travel meet in the spring, but at least we won't have to.  Especially if it interferes with AP testing.

Mike drove to St. George where we stopped for dinner at Cracker Barrel.  I then drove for about an hour until Mike took over.  He drove most of the way home.  We stopped about an hour and a half away in a parking lot somewhere.  It is really nice to be able to do that!