THE diving club which was the birthplace to the career of Chris Mears has paid tribute to its new Olympic champion.

Chris, 23, from Burghfield Common, became the first Briton to claim a diving gold after he and his partner Jack Laugher emerged victorious in the three-metre synchronised springboard in Rio.

His diving career began at the age of eight when he joined the Albatross Diving Club on Battle Road, Reading, after being recommended to the club by a coach on a summer council course.

“He was a very bubbly boy,” recalled one of Chris’s first coaches at Albatross, Jeff Pearce, 67. “But he was also very shy for someone of that age. Once you got to know him a bit more, you realised how personable he was.

“What stood out for me is that Chris had so much ability, he had bags of potential - and the right attitude, too. He always listened very intently and he never said ‘I can’t’.”

In fact, it was two years earlier that Chris Mears’ prodigious talent was first spotted. Sheila Kirrane, of the Albatross’ diving instructors, remembered seeing a mischievous six-year-old with heaps of talent.

Sheila, 66, – who started with the club in 1988 and is still there to this day – was teaching a summer council course with the help of her then 17-year-old daughter Kimberley, when Chris first caught her gaze.

“I just remember watching him and thinking, ‘he has the most amazing jump’. Chris had the best balance and the perfect frame for a diver,” she remembered. “I just thought to myself, I need to go and speak to his mum.

“Chris didn’t like diving into the pool head first when he began – I don’t think anyone does really. But that was one of our requirements and he didn’t have the confidence to do it.

“But that’s when Jeff Pearce picked him up. He was the perfect person to work with Chris at that age because he was so patient and he knew he could work with him and take him to that next level.”

It was at the turn of the Millennium and soon after the Sydney Olympics in 2000 when Chris first became interested in diving.

Looking back on those early days, Jeff Pearce remembered how the young protégé’s outstanding talent was evident from day one.

He said: “I taught him for about a year-and-a-half before we took him to an Olympic testing event, and that is when they snapped him up. The rest, as they say, is history.”

It’s fitting that last Wednesday, Chris’s former coach was teaching the next crop of talent at Albatross on the evening Chris won. Despite wanting to watch Chris, he’d made a commitment to teach his regular Wednesday class.

He’d recorded the television coverage to watch later that night, but as soon as the result was known, the retired Burghfield AWE supervisor from Tilehurst was bombarded with text messages celebrating the news.

“I’m just delighted for Chris, I’m absolutely over the moon,” he added. “You could see it from the first dive that he had a medal in him, but he surprised us all by beating the Chinese.

“We always knew that he had an Olympic medal in him, but to do this, I’m so happy for him. He is a lovely, lovely boy. Never once has he forgotten where he’s come from.

“He came down to Albatross a few Christmas’ ago and was signing autographs, chatting to the kids and parents. His whole story just goes to show what you can achieve with hard work.”

Despite working with him from a young age, Jeff Pearce knew that Chris needed to work under the tutelage of a more experienced coach to progress.

This was when Chris began to work with Malcolm Green, the lead coach at Albatross for the past 20 years, who, like those before him, realised that he had a diver of immeasurable potential.

“It became apparent very quickly that Chris was extremely talented,” remembers Malcolm, 51, from Caversham, who has been involved with the diving club since it was founded by his mother Anne Jessel in 1978.

“He was athletic, he could jump high. But most importantly, he was willing. He wasn’t afraid and wanted to try anything and everything.

“He was always happy, always smiling. I never had any doubt that he’d go on to do great things and I didn’t think it would be too long before he would become a national performance diver.

“When he was nine-years-old he was a club champion. When he was 12, he was included in the national world class start programme and moved to Southampton under the national head coach, Lindsey Fraser.”

It was at this moment when Malcolm realised his young protégé had outgrown Albatross and now was the time to spread his wings.

“This was one of the hardest decisions I ever had to make in letting him go,” admitted Malcolm. “But I knew it was in the best interests of Chris and now it has all paid off, hasn’t it?”

Now Malcolm shares an overwhelming sense of satisfaction. “This is the first gold medal for Great Britain in diving. This makes me extremely proud, having worked with him in his younger years,” he beamed.

“We are a small club, but now we have an Olympic champion, nobody else can say that. My hope is that Chris’s successes can go a long way into securing future diving facilities in Reading.

“Already this week we have been flooded with enquiries with young children wanting tasters. This, I’m sure, will have an effect across the country as it did during the weeks following London 2012.”

There was similar joy in the Kirrane household who watched Chris on television win the gold medal with Jack Laugher in dramatic fashion.

Despite the tension, Sheila said she was sure that she was about to witness the defining moment in the Berkshire diver’s career.

“Even when the Chinese pair were about to dive I was confident that they had a really good chance of getting the gold, because Chris and Jack just nailed their dive,” she admitted.

“And when they won, it was absolutely amazing. After everything he has been through with his illness it’s a wonderful story.”

It seemed as if the entire Albatross Diving Club was glued to a television somewhere to capture the golden moment in Rio.

Club secretary, Emma West, 49, was on holiday in St. Lucia when Chris won, but she watched the thrilling finale from a catamaran with her two children James, 12 and Charlotte, 15.

Emma said: “I was just beside myself. I burst into tears. I could see Chris and Jack in tears as well.

“The thing about the diving community is that it is so small. Everyone knows everyone. My son is a diver and when he goes to compete, people like Chris, Jack and Tom Daley are there competing too.

“These boys are always very encouraging and will always help each other. And that’s what is so amazing about this story is that they are such lovely boys and fully deserve their success.

“Everything led to this moment since Chris first came to the club. This gold medal is an incredible achievement for the development and the future of the sport.”