Joel Rodriguez: Coaching Champions, One Dive at a Time

NSW Institute of Sport (NSWIS) diving coach Joel Rodriguez said the podium efforts by Lauren Flint and Milly Puckeridge at the recent Southern Cross Diving Series in Auckland, New Zealand was a tremendous opportunity for Flint, who is on the comeback track from a wicked elbow injury, to realise she was ready to compete at the elite level again.

“She was a bit nervous”, Rodriguez said of Flint. “But it was good that Lauren had a few competitions so she could feel for herself that she was capable again – especially when doing synchro with Millie.”

He was as equally impressed by Puckeridge, whose career was frustrated by wrist injuries.

Consistency. Discipline. Resilience. These are the three pillars of Rodriguez’s coaching philosophy, and it has been decades in the making as first an elite athlete and now a mentor. However, the performances by his two charges in the 10m events in Auckland reinforced that his approach does work. Indeed, both Puckeridge, who won a gold medal in the individual event, and Flint, who secured silver, performed as though they hadn’t missed a beat.

“As an athlete, the more you invest, the more you’re going to get”, Rodriguez said in between an NSWIS squad training session at Sydney Olympic Park.

“They have been very consistent; focused on what they have to do. They really want to do well and that helps a lot for us as coaches – just to see that every day, it makes the work easier because we are connected with them”.

The Power of Now

Born and raised in Mexico, Rodriguez, a two-time Olympian, knows the dedication and courage that is needed to stand at the top of the 10m platform, poised above a sea of thousands of screaming supporters.

While he excelled at world championship level – Rodriguez claimed two gold medals, five silver, and seven bronzes – he admits his career had its challenges.

“I was great in training”, Rodriguez recalled. “But transferring what I was doing in training, into the competition was the tricky part”. He admitted to visualising the competition and his dives in advance: “the springboard, the judges, the divers. I used to repeat every dive in my head before sleeping”.

Rodriguez also remembers the intense pressure of competition, citing that as the reason why he developed a habit of avoiding the scoreboard. “Every time I was doing the match, I was like – ‘it has to be an eight or a nine.’ I was playing [the game] like that”, he revealed before discussing the importance of clearing his mind through meditation.

 “When I learned how to do that, it was such a relief because, before, when I didn’t know exactly how to compete in competitions. . .it was scary”.

“For me, it [became] a display, [and] I forgot about the competition. No pressure, [just] enjoying, and it was great”.

“A five-minute transit through my eyelids, and it was just like resetting a computer – you don’t get any negative thoughts.”

Rodriguez believes athletes must trust and believe in the work they’ve put in; that it wasn’t luck that has allowed them to succeed.

“Sleeping is [also] the key for you to perform better the next day, because when you’re nervous, you can’t even sleep”, he said. “And that affects a lot of your performance”.

“Diving is very mental. You have to mentally prepare and make sure bad thoughts don’t get into your head. You have to have big signs of stop…cover your eyes and focus on your target.”

From Olympian to Mentor

Rodriguez’s transition into coaching was almost accidental, but it changed everything. In 2005, he visited his old swimming centre in Mexico and found a group of divers training without a coach. They had been left behind in favour of others for elite training at a different centre.

“They told me there was no coach. So, I was like, ‘well, [do] you want to start training?’”

“But I told them: ‘this is the situation – they took the ‘best’ divers, but the best are here, right? So, my question for you is, do you think you’re not good enough, or [do] you want to prove [to] yourself that you can be the best?”

 Rodriguez’s underdogs soon became the top dogs. “At nationals, they won everything”, he said.

From there, opportunities followed. He coached in Florida, United States before receiving an offer to work in Indianapolis with the USA national team. But when Australia came calling in 2010, he couldn’t resist.

“I knew that Sydney [was] one of the best programs,” he said. “So, that’s what I wanted, I wanted to be there. I really liked Australia since the first time I came here [prior to the 2000 Olympics]”.

This practice has never left him. To this day, his athletes – like Flint and Puckeridge, who had flawless returns from injury – have the desire to prove themselves no matter the setbacks.  

His first coaching experience in Mexico would define Rodriguez’s entire approach to mentoring. In training the underdogs and turning them into champions, it highlighted that success isn’t just about skill; it’s about seizing the opportunity, staying consistent, and believing in yourself.

“You know, it’s really hard to stop them”, he said of the NSWIS athletes. “They don’t want to stop. They want to keep going and we have to tell them ‘No, no, wait. Let’s recover.’ But that’s the effect of diving – you don’t want to stop”.

Coaching at NSWIS

For the past 15 years, Rodriguez has been an integral part of NSWIS, guiding athletes through the highs and lows of elite sport. He sums up his style in one word:

“Simple,” he said.

“I put myself on the side of the athletes.” He finds that coaching divers based on his own experiences – whether it be how he stood on a springboard or platform – is most effective because he has lived those moments.

His experience allows him to guide the athletes through challenges such as “stress, nerves, [or] fear”, to “make a better performance”.

Rodriguez also recognises success isn’t just about physical ability. He considers injuries, setbacks, and self-doubt as inevitable, a part of the divers’ lot. His job is to make sure that his athletes “keep going in the right direction, and with the right people”.

“We have to somehow convince them every day that they are doing well,” he said. “Even if they are not injured, [my role as a coach] is 100 percent support.”

But at the same time, Rodriguez seems to believe in grounding his athletes; not sugarcoating the realities of elite sport. In keeping impartial to the highest of highs and the lowest of lows, he makes diving a way of life for his athletes.

“Not every day is Christmas, I tell them”. “Every day is important”, elaborating on the importance of consistent preparation. “Every day is the competition; it is not just what you’re doing. It’s like an exam; you study for the exam. So, every day is important to be prepared and do 100% every day.”

Rodriguez’s drive and passion for diving is undeniable, and it’s on show regardless of whether he is working with divers at every stage – from juniors making their senior international debut, to rising stars, and veterans returning from injury.

He credits the supportive system of the NSWIS coaches keeping the momentum of athletes going, for them to achieve their goals, explaining that “We look after each other. When I’m away, Chava [Sobrino, NSWIS Diving Head Coach oversees] them, or vice versa when he goes away for competition, I look after his athletes. That coordination makes things easier, and we keep the team working on what they need for them to achieve their goals”.

Despite the demands of high performance sport, Rodriguez wouldn’t trade his life for anything else. “[Working for NSWIS] is an honour for me,” he said. “It definitely is a pleasure for me to be working for this Institute. I feel so proud, and just to be in the team for me is very motivating every day to do my best and keep improving”.

“When you do what you love, it’s when you stop working. So, I feel like it’s fun every day. I don’t want to miss a day. I don’t really want to have holidays!”

Rodriguez’s testimony to the pursuit of excellence is this: “To achieve something big, sometimes you have to go through a lot of obstacles. And you have to be tough, sometimes it doesn’t happen. Train harder, and if it doesn’t happen, even harder. You have to be very stubborn.”

Words and portrait of Joel by Rachel Tingey, NSWIS