It might be easy to draw comparisons between Matthew Dixon and Tom Daley.
Both divers come from Plymouth, started at a young age and are platform specialists.
But with Daley choosing to take the rest of the year off competitions, Dixon is determined now is his time to shine.
So far this year he has won a British championship and picked up two Commonwealth silver medals, - in the individual 10m and synchro event with London based Noah Williams who he has been diving with for just over a year. The pair made finals at the World Cup in Wuhan, China, and now both have qualified for the European team in August.
Dixon and Williams often find
themselves in a situation where they compete together in certain events,
but against each other when they compete individually.
Dixon said: “We do sometimes compete against each other in the synchro.
We will both look at the scores and see who got higher and I’ll go ‘I got an
8.5 for that and you got an 8 so it’s 1-0 to me.'
“It makes it a bit more fun and takes some of the pressure
off.
“At the Commonwealth Games we were a bit gutted not to get a gold together, but coming out with a silver against Tom and Dan we were still happy.”
Despite the two medals on the Gold Coast Matthew says his life
hasn’t changed at all, and he is now fully focused on giving a great
performance against Europe’s best.
“I’m not thinking about anything but diving well and making sure my results showing that I’m trying to be the best. I'm not letting the Tom Daley comparisons get into my head.
“Once the Europeans are over I’m going to go on holiday, then start learning some new dives for the new season, although I can’t say what they are just yet!”
You can see Matthew and Noah at Glasgow 2018 from August 2 to 12. Tickets are still available here.