Better Together: Olympic Diver, Lizzie Roussel, Shares Her Story
“I focus on my breath, I pray, and then I just go for it.”
This is how Lizzie Roussel, a 26-year-old New Zealand native, LSU alumni, mother, wife, part-time F45 coach, and Olympic diver prepares for her dives in competitions. After competing in the Rio Olympics on her 19th birthday, qualifying for the 2020 games, and now placing 21st in the world to qualify for the 2024 games representing New Zealand, Lizzie is the 1st diver in New Zealand history to qualify for the Olympics twice. In 2016, she was the first Olympic diver from New Zealand in 24 years.
It hasn’t been a picture perfect road, though.
“A lot of things I don’t plan… I’ve always been pretty good at navigating situations that have been thrown at me—because a lot have—and I’ve just had to go with it, and I’ve always ended up okay.”
As a child, Lizzie fell in love with gymnastics and had progressed a great deal by age 8. But when she broke her arm, she took a step back from the sport and re-routed. With her mom as a swim coach at the local pool and missing her days of flipping around, Lizzie took to the diving board on her own one day and just starting flipping off. A coach saw her, told her mom she should come to a community diving class, and she’s been diving ever since.
She credits the blossoming of her diving career to her coaches in New Zealand from ages 14-17.
As a Canadien-American couple, they were much more versed in the world of diving than many local New Zealand coaches, and suggested she consider moving to the US for college if she wanted to continue diving while going to university.
But how does a school in America hear about a diver in New Zealand?
First, you have to be good enough. Then, you have to compete. “You don’t get any funding in New Zealand as a diver. It’s very financially tough, mostly the travel costs. Because New Zealand is so far, it costs minimum $5,000 just to travel to the competitions.” Lizzie self-fundraised as a teen, asking businesses for money.
“I’ve had to really ask for help and be humbled a lot. But I’m grateful for that in a sense because I’ve met some really lovely, generous people that I don’t know that I would have met if everything was just paid for.”
-Lizzie
When it came time to make her move to the US, Lizzie and her coaches put together their own recruitment videos and drafted tons of emails and “basically spammed a bunch of universities.”
“I got offers from Tennessee and LSU, and I really liked them both. I visited both. It was a really hard choice. But I really just liked the weather in Louisiana better… and the colors,” she says with a smile. Lizzie dove for LSU for 4 years, collected 4 SEC silvers, placed 5th & 6th at NCAAs, and currently still holds the record for the 3 meter dive at LSU.
Her sights had been set on the 2020 games even before Rio.
“2016 was kind of like a bonus games, but 2020 was the Olympics I always dreamed of going to.” At 22, in peak mental & physical form, and with her own personal best score to qualify in 2019, COVID happens and postpones the Olympics. Enter: curveball. As she tried to regroup for the postponed games, she got pregnant with her first child. “The first thing that goes off in my head is: I’m not gunna be able to go to the Olympics.”
But in 2 days, Lizzie, will board a flight to Edinburgh: her first stop on her way to Paris for the 2024 Olympic Games.
Her 2.5 year-old daughter, Athena, and husband, Ryan, will join her as the games get closer. Lizzie says she’s stronger than she was before. “There’s a lot of negativity out there. A lot of people were like ‘there goes your body, there goes everything,’ but that’s just not the case that I found. I feel like, your life just continues, it’s just better.”
Lizzie will spend 4 days in Edinburgh to practice on a fulcrum diving board, which is different than the board she uses to train at LSU, and will be used in the games, too. Then, she’ll travel to Paris for the opening ceremony, train for 5 days there, then spend some time away from the village to sightsee and relax with ehr family before she dives on August 7th at 8am CST.
Ever curious and eager to meet new people, Alan met Lizzie at F45, where he can be found most mornings at 7:30am. Prism Group believes we’re all better together and is proud to be a small part of sponsoring Lizzie and her family’s travels to Paris for her games appearance this summer. Lizzie, your hard work and dedication to doing what you love is inspirational, and we can’t wait to cheer you on in just a few weeks! Safe travels, and Geaux Tigers!
Each diver can choose his/her own dives but 1 of each of their 5 dives must be from these categories.
