Ex-State Champ High On Diving

Four or five times a day, John Maxson climbs 80 feet up a ladder, stands atop a tiny platform and plunges head-first toward the earth.

So far, he hasn’t missed the swimming pool.

Maxson, a 1991 graduate of East Wenatchee’s Eastmont High School, dives for a living. He’s spending the summer traveling around the country, diving in front of thousands of spectators at fairs and theme parks. The pay isn’t great.

“They couldn’t pay you enough if you didn’t enjoy it,” Maxson said. “It’s the safest thing in the world, but it could kill you.”

Maxson has enjoyed diving ever since he joined a Wenatchee YMCA diving team while in sixth grade. In high school, he became Washington’s first (and still only) four-time high school diving champion, setting the state points record (which was broken lasst winter). That talent earned Maxson a scholarship to Michigan State University, where he finished as high as fourth in the Big Ten championships. Maxson graduated from Michigan State in May with a degree in physical education and exercise science.

While looking for a summer job two years ago, Maxson hooked up with Watershow Productions in Minneapolis.

“I wanted to do something while diving at Michigan State in the summer,” Maxson said. “I didn’t want to do any training. I called up the company and pretty much have been doing it since.”

The show is a combination of diving, acrobatics and traveling circus. The team arrives at a place (he recently was at the New York State Fair and the Los Angeles County Fair), puts on several shows a day for a week or more, then heads someplace else.

The troupe’s most spectacular show features three divers, with Maxson in the middle. While Maxson does a flying back somersault from 80 feet, divers on both sides plunge 65 feet, with all three landing in a pool 25 fet wide and 10 feet deep.

“From up there, it pretty much looks like a glass of water,” Maxson said. “I’m usually having a pretty good time up there, because you can see for miles. For the last week, I’ve been watching the sunset every night.”

It gets a bit tricky, however, when the wind blows.

“The other day, I almost landed on a guy because it was so bad,” he said. Diving from 80 feet high takes time to learn. The highest dive in the Olympics is 10 meters (about 33 feet). Maxson learned by diving from 10 meters, then raising the height five or 10 feet, until he reached 80 feet.

Maxson plans to continue diving into the fall. His employer has agreed to sponsor Maxson in the Acapulco international cliff diving championships in November. It’s not a competition for the faint of heart. There are two perches, one 65 feet high, which requires leaping out to clear 12 feet of rock, the other 87 feet, with 20 feet of rock to clear.

The Acapulco trip is mostly for fun.

“I’m not sure how I’ll do, but it’s a cheap vacation anyway,” Maxson said. “I got tired of school and am going to play for a while.”