(2 August 1996; Day 14)
It has taken eight years, but Patrick JEFFREY has come full circle. On Friday night the 31-year-old part-time coach and part-time photographer once again will make the long climb up the flights of stairs to the top of the 10m diving platform as he has done countless thousands of times over the past 20 years. One more time, JEFFREY will stare into that nameless sea of faces, knowing that he -- yes, he -- is the object of their undivided attention and breathless silence.
Once again JEFFREY will win that inward battle with fear which every successful diver who scales the platform must. He will turn his back on the crowd, embark on his familiar handstand and hurl himself seemingly kamikaze-like into the Atlanta night, spiraling and somersaulting as he falls the more than three stories to the surface of the water below.
And then, when he has completed his final dive, he will wave goodbye one last time.
"I'm really enjoying this," JEFFREY said Friday after the semifinals of the men's 10m platform at the Centennial Olympic Games. "I'm seeing it all now through the eyes of an adult instead of the eyes of a child."
JEFFREY is competing in his second Olympic Games, having finished 12th in the same event at the 1988 Games in Seoul despite competing with a 101-degree fever. A three-time U.S. national champion, JEFFREY was devastated by his failure to earn one of the two spots on the United States team for the 1992 Games in Barcelona. Now, having weathered that disappointment as well as injuries to his back and elbows, he has learned to savor the moment on the Olympic stage.
"The thing that's so incredible is it's like an endpoint to what I began eight years ago," JEFFREY said. "I want to leave this sport on a high. I want to remember this as the best ever. My best score ever on platform was at the U.S. Olympic Trials."
Entering Friday night's final, JEFFREY stands in sixth place, 66.30 points behind leader Dmitri SAOUTINE of the Russian Federation and 30.33 behind TIAN Liang of the People's Republic of China for the bronze medal position. His former coach, Ron O'BRIEN, believes a medal is very much within JEFFREY's reach.
An avid follower of the sport, JEFFREY is conscientious of the United States' unparalleled tradition in platform diving and that a medal, particularly the golden variety, would place his name alongside those of American diving legends: Dr. Sammy LEE, Bob WEBSTER and Greg LOUGANIS. Yet he has been able to avoid allowing the pressure to impact his performance thus far.
"I would love to get a medal," JEFFREY said. "But I'm just thinking performance."
JEFFREY has come to understand that there is more to competing than merely the numbers with which the international, eagle-eyed panel of judges will critique his effort. That lies in his own heart and soul. If Patrick JEFFREY can meet his own standards, his final Olympic experience will be one to treasure forever.
This is an official publication of the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games Sports Publications Department. Written by Mark Vinson.
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| An estimated 5.3 million visted Centennial Olympic Park between opening day - 13 July - and closing day - 4 August, making the park the most single most visited Olympic site during the Games. |