David Snively

Snively took up diving at the relatively late age of 14. In 1974, he was spending all of his spare time on swimming and diving practice lessons, which also necessitated a lot of cash from his parents to fund his training. His parents made him decide between the two sports, to which he chose diving as he considered himself to be progressing at a much faster rate. Snively won several Canadian diving championships for his age, and in 1977 he competed in his second senior nationals, finishing third in each of the 10-metre and 3-metre events, qualifying him for the Canadian National Diving Team. He attributed his success to coach Don Webb, who was the first full time diving coach hired in Canada in 1974. Webb considered Snively to be inconsistent, to which Snively accepted and noted, "I have to work at it, but that'll come with experience". Snively had ambitions to win a gold medal at the 1978 Commonwealth Games, although conceded that he didn't want diving to "become his life" and vowed to quit if he ever began to hate it. Prior to the Commonwealth Games, he would spend four to five hours a day on average training, which didn't include his other sports training in weight lifting and trampolining.[2]

During the 1980 Olympic trials, he finished third and qualified for the final berth on the national team, but missed his opportunity when Canada boycotted the event in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. At that time, Snively faced the difficult choice of either waiting another four years to compete or end his diving career. Prior to the 1980 Olympics, he was considered as one of Canada's "most outstanding divers".[3] Despite not being able to compete in the Olympics, Snively and fellow diver Debbie Fuller put on admirable displays in Split, Yugoslavia, with Snively achieving 3rd place on the 3-metre springboard and tower events, as part of a tour of three countries designed to lessen the blow of not competing in Moscow. The same week when competing in Madrid, Spain, Snively won a gold and silver medal.[4] During the Canadian National Winter Championships which took place during March 1981 at Pointe Claire, he won as the men's overall champion and received a $1,000 scholarship from Adidas-Arena. The final event of the competition, the men's 3-metre, was also won by Snivley, beating his teammate Mitch Geller.[5]

During the years leading up to the 1984 Summer Olympics, he ranked as one of the best two divers in Canada. During that time, the competition was intensifying and Snively ultimately fell behind two competitors who were ultimately chosen to participate in the Olympics, David Bedard and Mark Rourke respectively. In the tower event trials, Snively came short of Rourke by just 3.36 points. He also fell short on the springboard trial events, again finishing third which ultimately concluded his career as a competitive diver.[3]