The National Federation of High School Athletic Associations recently made changes to diving rules that will take effect next year. At the forefront of these changes is the wording that describes a forward approach. the bottom line is that hops, skips and jumps will be legal in high school diving next year.

• High School Rule Changes for 2011

Photo: NISCA

High school diving season is drawing to a close. Just about all states have had their championship meets except for California, Colorado, Kansas and Nevada who do not finish until the end of May.

And with this conclusion comes the rush to get tapes in for All American consideration. A lot of interesting tapes and one aspect of these tapes that causes me great consternation, is the last minute use of dives in order to bump up the total difficulty of a diver's list. Back and reverse doubles are the worst offender, although quite a few back 2 1/2 twisting somersaults are tossed in because well, the D.D. is 2.7!

Divers and coaches are continually mesmerized by lure of more points.  It is a scenario that is more common in high school competition, but certainly not limited to it.

"If the D.D. on a dive is greater, then I can score more points!" It very rarely happens, and if it does, then it's generally a fluke.

Now I know high school divers are asked to do six optionals, and many times this is pushing the boundary on their skill level and practice time, but doing 1 1/2 somersaults for 6's is always going to be better than 2 somersaults for 2's.

I can't say this enough - The best way to be successful in diving is to do dives competently and confidently. The competent part comes from doing dives that receive good scores, and the confident part follows from seeing those scores and being able to move on to the next dive instead of fixating the bad one.

Bad dives don't score a lot of points. And bad dives usually occur from lack of practice. And when a diver decides to change a dive two days before a meet or won't practice that more difficult dive, it usually spells trouble.

Don't do a dive that you "think" will earn you more points. Do a dive that you "know" will earn you more points. If it's an easier dive, a dive with lower D.D., then so be it.

• What Dive to Use When Competing
• Land on Your Hands, Not on Your Feet

I'm sure you were sitting around this week thinking to yourself, "I wonder which school did the best at the NCAA Championships?" Or maybe, "I wonder which conference had the strongest divers this past year?"

I know it was certainly foremost on my mind this past week.

So in order to satisfy my curiosity, I've crunched the numbers again this year and have come up a few earth shattering rankings for schools based on the recent NCAA division I results!

• Best College Diving Program in 2011
• Best Conference for Diving in 2011

Lots of international events going on this summer and you might ask yourself, "Self, how does one make an international team?"

I could answer that question by giving you a link and telling you to read the selection procedures. But I'm a nicer guy than that, so what I will do is summarize what it takes. And of the two big events this summer, the World Championships in Shanghai, China comes first - July 16-15 to be exact, so I'll cover that for starters.

To make the world championships team on 3-meter and platform, it takes a two-step process that began in February at Winter Nationals in Iowa. That first step included finishing in the top-four places in the individual 3-meter and platform events. These top four divers became eligible for the next step; the AT&T USA Grand Prix, scheduled for May 5-8 in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Step 2 is where it gets a bit dicey. These top four divers will carry 50% of their scores from Winter Nationals - the combined prelim, semi-final and finals scores, to the Grand Prix for a four diver battle for the top two spots. Once at the Grand Prix, it becomes a one-shot deal, as only the prelims matter. The divers will take their score from the prelims and add that to their total from Winter Nationals (50% of course) and the top-two are headed to China.

Whew, time to take a breath.

Luckily the selection procedures for 1-meter and synchro are a bit more cut and dried. One event, and the top synchro team and top two finishers on 1-meter make the team.

That event is the World Championships Synchronized and 1-meter Selection Trials that will take place the week after the Grand Prix in Tallahassee, Fla. - in other words, May 12-15.

Any questions?

Here's the link ... read the procedures!