University of Georgia Athletics
Colwill & Hoffa: Consistently Excellent
February 01, 2018 | General, Track & Field, Swimming & Diving, The Frierson Files
By John Frierson
Staff Writer
They were never Georgia student-athletes at the same time, and their sports couldn't be more different, but diver Chris Colwill and shot putter Reese Hoffa have a lot in common.
The former Bulldogs competed for the United States in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and again in London in 2012 — Hoffa also competed in Athens in 2004 — and they were both models of consistency as professionals, year after year ranking among the best in their sports.
Both are now retired from competition after distinguished careers and have gotten into coaching at least part-time, and both are now members of Georgia's hallowed Circle of Honor.
Colwill and Hoffa, along with football legend Thomas Davis and softball all-time great Nicole Barber, will be honored at the Circle of Honor gala Friday night. For all, there is much to celebrate.
"I never thought I'd be in the Circle of Honor," Hoffa said this week. "It's really hard to qualify, the committee is very strict on who they're going to let in, so when they told me I was in, I was floored."
Hoffa's Georgia story began with a phone call. Don Babbitt, Georgia's associate head coach and throws coach, said the very first recruiting call he made after coming to Georgia in 1996 was to Hoffa's coach at Lakeside High School in Augusta.
"That was a good phone call," Babbitt said.
Hoffa (1998-2001) was a three-time All-American and the 2001 SEC outdoor champion, but he was just getting started. Babbitt compared Hoffa to former Georgia running back Terrell Davis, they were both good in college and among the very best as pros.
Continuing to train with Babbitt after graduating in 2002, Hoffa kept improving year after year. He was ranked No. 1 in the world in four different years, even as a 37-year-old in 2014, and for 10 straight years he was among the top three in the world.
"He's from Georgia, he went to Georgia and it's really fitting that he's going into the Circle of Honor," Babbitt said. "He's a Georgia success story."
A two-time world champion, three-time USA outdoor champion and three-time Olympian, Hoffa earned a bronze medal in his final Games, in London.
"That just goes to show, you may not get it done the first couple of times, but if you just keep trying new things and keep growing as an athlete, eventually you'll achieve something great," said Hoffa, who runs his Hoffa Throws Academy in Watkinsville and is also a licensed physical therapist.
Unlike Hoffa, who never quite won an NCAA shot put title at Georgia, Colwill reached spectacular heights in college, winning the 1-meter and 3-meter springboard NCAA titles in 2006 and, after redshirting in 2007 to train for the World Championships, winning the 3-meter title again in 2008.
"Winning the national championships in 2006, that really was a pivotal moment for me," Colwill said. "That's when I realized the potential I had as a diver and I knew that I was beginning to take my talent to the next level."
"He was a write-in when we made the dual-meets lineup. We'd just put first and first, 1-meter and 3-meter," Georgia's Tom Cousins swimming and diving head coach Jack Bauerle said.
Colwill and Georgia diving coach Dan Laak worked together for nine years, during his Bulldog years and beyond. By the time Colwill retired from diving after the London Olympics in 2012, he'd been the top American in the 3-meter for most of the previous decade always placed among the top 10 at the big international meets.
Colwill, who's married to former Georgia All-America swimmer Chelsea Nauta, said his favorite post-college moment came in 2008, when he and Laak participated in the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.
"Walking in there with Dan, there's really no better moment than to have somebody that you work with for so long and to be able to appreciate something so special together, walking through the tunnel to where it opens up to a sea of people celebrating all the athletes from around the world," Colwill said.
For Laak, the moment he comes back to was four years later, at the 2012 Olympic Trials. Colwill was in third place — only the top two divers qualify — going into the 3-meter finals, 42 points out of first. Even before the sixth and final dive of the finals, Colwill had moved into the lead.
Colwill's final dive was his signature dive, Laak said, the reverse three-and-a-half. He not only nailed it, it was the highest-scoring dive of the competition.
"That day was just a perfect day and one that I'll never forget," Laak said.
Laak said seeing Colwill get inducted into the Circle of Honor, the first Georgia diver to do so, makes him "feel like a proud papa."
"I wish all my divers could be like that, but Chris is special," he said, "and there's only one Chris Colwill."
Who knows, things may come full circle one day and Colwill will experience the same feelings. Along with working in the family business, Colwill Engineering, he's now running Team Colwill Diving back home in Brandon, Fla., at the Brandon Sports & Aquatic Center where he first took up the sport as a child,
Staff Writer
They were never Georgia student-athletes at the same time, and their sports couldn't be more different, but diver Chris Colwill and shot putter Reese Hoffa have a lot in common.
The former Bulldogs competed for the United States in the 2008 Olympics in Beijing and again in London in 2012 — Hoffa also competed in Athens in 2004 — and they were both models of consistency as professionals, year after year ranking among the best in their sports.
Both are now retired from competition after distinguished careers and have gotten into coaching at least part-time, and both are now members of Georgia's hallowed Circle of Honor.
Colwill and Hoffa, along with football legend Thomas Davis and softball all-time great Nicole Barber, will be honored at the Circle of Honor gala Friday night. For all, there is much to celebrate.
"I never thought I'd be in the Circle of Honor," Hoffa said this week. "It's really hard to qualify, the committee is very strict on who they're going to let in, so when they told me I was in, I was floored."
Hoffa's Georgia story began with a phone call. Don Babbitt, Georgia's associate head coach and throws coach, said the very first recruiting call he made after coming to Georgia in 1996 was to Hoffa's coach at Lakeside High School in Augusta.
"That was a good phone call," Babbitt said.
Hoffa (1998-2001) was a three-time All-American and the 2001 SEC outdoor champion, but he was just getting started. Babbitt compared Hoffa to former Georgia running back Terrell Davis, they were both good in college and among the very best as pros.
Continuing to train with Babbitt after graduating in 2002, Hoffa kept improving year after year. He was ranked No. 1 in the world in four different years, even as a 37-year-old in 2014, and for 10 straight years he was among the top three in the world.
"He's from Georgia, he went to Georgia and it's really fitting that he's going into the Circle of Honor," Babbitt said. "He's a Georgia success story."
A two-time world champion, three-time USA outdoor champion and three-time Olympian, Hoffa earned a bronze medal in his final Games, in London.
"That just goes to show, you may not get it done the first couple of times, but if you just keep trying new things and keep growing as an athlete, eventually you'll achieve something great," said Hoffa, who runs his Hoffa Throws Academy in Watkinsville and is also a licensed physical therapist.
Unlike Hoffa, who never quite won an NCAA shot put title at Georgia, Colwill reached spectacular heights in college, winning the 1-meter and 3-meter springboard NCAA titles in 2006 and, after redshirting in 2007 to train for the World Championships, winning the 3-meter title again in 2008.
"Winning the national championships in 2006, that really was a pivotal moment for me," Colwill said. "That's when I realized the potential I had as a diver and I knew that I was beginning to take my talent to the next level."
"He was a write-in when we made the dual-meets lineup. We'd just put first and first, 1-meter and 3-meter," Georgia's Tom Cousins swimming and diving head coach Jack Bauerle said.
Colwill and Georgia diving coach Dan Laak worked together for nine years, during his Bulldog years and beyond. By the time Colwill retired from diving after the London Olympics in 2012, he'd been the top American in the 3-meter for most of the previous decade always placed among the top 10 at the big international meets.
Colwill, who's married to former Georgia All-America swimmer Chelsea Nauta, said his favorite post-college moment came in 2008, when he and Laak participated in the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics.
"Walking in there with Dan, there's really no better moment than to have somebody that you work with for so long and to be able to appreciate something so special together, walking through the tunnel to where it opens up to a sea of people celebrating all the athletes from around the world," Colwill said.
For Laak, the moment he comes back to was four years later, at the 2012 Olympic Trials. Colwill was in third place — only the top two divers qualify — going into the 3-meter finals, 42 points out of first. Even before the sixth and final dive of the finals, Colwill had moved into the lead.
Colwill's final dive was his signature dive, Laak said, the reverse three-and-a-half. He not only nailed it, it was the highest-scoring dive of the competition.
"That day was just a perfect day and one that I'll never forget," Laak said.
Laak said seeing Colwill get inducted into the Circle of Honor, the first Georgia diver to do so, makes him "feel like a proud papa."
"I wish all my divers could be like that, but Chris is special," he said, "and there's only one Chris Colwill."
Who knows, things may come full circle one day and Colwill will experience the same feelings. Along with working in the family business, Colwill Engineering, he's now running Team Colwill Diving back home in Brandon, Fla., at the Brandon Sports & Aquatic Center where he first took up the sport as a child,
John Frierson is the staff writer for the UGA Athletic Association and curator of the ITA Men's Tennis Hall of Fame. You can find his work at: Frierson Files. He's also on Twitter: @FriersonFiles and @ITAHallofFame.
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