The Olympic dream formed a long time ago, way back in Puerto Rico, almost 14 years ago, when Rafael Quintero was 7.
He was a gymnast then, and a good one, once regarded among the top juniors on the island.
At 12, he picked up diving on the side, until the path to the Olympics took flight.
By the age of 15, he had found his calling on the platform, utilizing his gymnastics background to soar through the air with grace and ease.
Six years later, the owner of numerous championships and honors — including the 2016 Pac-12 Men’s Diver of the Year — the Arizona Wildcats senior has reached Phase 1 of his dream. Quintero participated in February’s FINA Diving World Cup in Rio de Janeiro, where he qualified for the Olympics with a top-eight finish in prelims.
“It definitely has a special significance to me,” Quintero said. “It’s what I’ve been working for since I was a little kid. It’s been like this one goal, just going to the Olympics.”
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Ah, but here’s the rub: This is only the first step up the ladder.
Quintero and his coaches have set admirable yet achievable goals for this year’s Olympics, with the far-off goal of further glory coming in four years, when Quintero should be peaking as a diver and as an athlete. The idea this year is simply to make it to the finals. No small feat.
Consider that Quintero is now just the fifth Arizona diver to make it to the Olympics, and just the second male. Puerto Rico hasn’t even had an Olympic diver in two decades. The country has eight total Olympic medals — two silver and six bronze. None in diving.
“As long as we get into the finals, top 12, maybe top 10, we’d be happy,” he said. “After that, we’d focus on getting on that podium. That’s a very possible goal.”
Quintero understands the difficulties of the road ahead, admitting, “It’s really hard to stay at the top once you’ve been at the top.”
He says he thinks he’ll be OK, and his motivation is not lacking.
It has its roots back in Puerto Rico, when Quintero began to tire of the rigor and routine of gymnastics
“A lot of gymnasts will tell you this: You want to do something else after 10 years of gymnastics, something new.”
He also realized that diving offered a clearer, perhaps more realistic route to the Olympics.
Then again, what route to the Olympics is realistic? But he was a very good gymnast. He would become a great diver.
He knew it early, too.
“I would say it was a calling,” he said. “After four months of diving, I went to my first Central American Games. Eight months, my first junior Pan-Am Games. I could see the difference there.”
He was able to transfer the grace and body motion he learned in gymnastics and use it in diving, but he says he still has some “bad habits.” His technique is still being refined. And that’s a scary proposition for others. He said his biggest leap came during his freshman year at Arizona.
“After training in this team environment, becoming more and more consistent, I was like, ‘this is it,’” he said. “I knew I could do this for 2016.”
And from here?
Who knows?
But the dream isn’t over.
