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Swimming & Diving
The Hokies welcome head diving coach Ron Piemonte back for his sixth season in Blacksburg. Piemonte brings over 30 years of diving and coaching experience, spanning throughout all levels of the sport. His impressive resume as a coach has brought him national and international recognition as one of the top coaches in the United States. He brings in several highly touted recruits for the 2011-2012 season.
Under Piemonte's guidance, diver Mikey McDonald became the first Hokie diver ever to qualify for the NCAA Championships while registering three top-20 finishes at the competition in 2008 and earning Honorable Mention All-America status in the one-meter and platform events. McDonald returned to the Championships in 2009, posting two top-15 finishes and collecting Honorable Mention All-America status for the second-straight year, this time in the one- and three-meter events.
Piemonte also coached McDonald to 10 individual titles throughout the season, including seven three-meter titles. McDonald broke the War Memorial Pool record in the one-meter that he set in 2007 and set a new record in the platform.
In 2010, Piemonte set a school record with leading four divers to the NCAAs, including Tech’s first female diver since 1982. Among the trio of male divers, sophomore Logan Shinholser became Tech’s first diver to earn All-America honors and the second male H2Okie ever to go All-American. Sarah Milton, Tech’s first female diver to qualify for NCAAs in 1982, competed in all three diving events. Milton placed 32nd in the 1-meter and 23rd in the 3-meter and the platform.
In 2005, Piemonte was voted the Most Outstanding Age Group Diving Coach in the United States. Prior to joining Tech, he spent five seasons at Moss Farms Diving, where he produced six different East National Champions, two YMCA National Champions, three different high school state champions, as well as three different divers who represented the United States in international competitions - one of whom was a bronze medalist on platform in the Junior Pan-Am Championships in Belem, Brazil. Besides coaching, for the last four years Ron has been the Vice President in charge of junior diving for USA Diving. For the last seven years he has been an instructor for coaches in safety certification and in all levels of educating and certifying coaches in belt spotting over trampoline, dryboard, and water.
Piemonte served ten years at the Tualatin Hills Dive Club in Beaverton, Ore., where his divers attained a high level of achievement. There he coached many junior national finalists, senior national qualifiers and finalists, junior and senior national team members who represented the United States in international competitions, two junior national champions, three Junior World Championship qualifiers (one bronze medalist) and an Olympic Trials finalist in 2000 on platform.
Piemonte was recognized as the Region 10 Coach of the Year and Zone D Coach of the Year in 1999. He is a six-time U.S. National Team coach and was ranked as one of the top-10 Junior Olympic coaches in the country by the International Olympic Committee of U.S. Diving.
Prior to his stint in Oregon, Piemonte split six seasons of coaching between Phoenix, Ariz., and Albuquerque, N.M. In Albuquerque, he was the head coach for men and women at the University of New Mexico while running an age group team of about 20 divers. Meanwhile, in Phoenix, he developed a very strong club program that consistently had both junior and senior national qualifiers and finalists.
As a diver, Piemonte competed at the national level from 1974 to 1985. As an athlete at Arizona State University, he was a Pac-10 champion, runner up and NCAA finalist. One of the highlights of his career was being able to train under the Japanese Olympic coach during his entire senior year of college.
Piemonte has been married for 24 years to wife, Tina, and has three children: Rachele, Leah and Ronnie. His oldest daughter Rachele is a sophomore at Virginia Tech and is in the honors program majoring in chemistry and biochemistry. Leah and Ronnie are both highly ranked divers and compete at the junior national level of U.S. Diving.
