Kimiko Soldati diver.(United States)

Byline: Julie Orringer

It's an April morning in Southern California, and Kimiko Soldati has been diving into a 57-degree lake again and again for a Vogue photo shoot. The chilly water is a far cry from her usual practice grounds in Texas, but she is upbeat and persistent, just as she is in her grueling Olympic training.

At 30, Soldati is the oldest female diver on the American team, though she doesn't see this as a disadvantage. "There's no reason why people in their 30s can't do well physically," Soldati told me. "Emotionally and mentally, they may be even stronger than younger divers." Indeed, she placed first in some of the most important competitions this year, including the 2004 World Cup Diving Trials.

She took up the sport fourteen years ago, but she's been a daredevil for a lot longer. At age two, she would scale the bookcases in her room and curl up at the very top, inches from the ceiling. A few years later, during free swim at Suzuki violin camp, she jumped off the strictly off-limits high dive and took her first three-meter plunge. "My parents put me into gymnastics class because I was driving them crazy at home," says Soldati. "When I was a kid, I lived more on my hands than I did on my feet." She dreamed of becoming an Olympic gymnast, but a knee injury sustained in ninth grade prevented her from ever competing in the sport again. After a year of physical therapy, her father suggested she try diving.

As it turned out, the sport was perfect for Soldati-her strength, five-foot-one frame, and gymnastic ability made her a natural. "She's one of the most physically talented athletes I've ever seen in my life," says her coach, former Olympic diver Kenny Armstrong. "She twists great; she flips great both forward and backward. She has every aspect of the sport that's required to be the best in the world."

Soldati's training begins at 6:15 a.m. six days a week and lasts for seven to eight hours. She starts on the StairMaster at home, then heads to the training center, where she does stretches and acrobatics. She conditions her fast-twitch muscles with plyometrics (high-intensity jumping exercises). She practices on a board mounted over a foam crash pit. Finally she gets into the water and dives for two hours. She has 25 dives to work on, ...