Getting his act together
Saint Rose's Brandon Birchak will juggle knives or dive from 80-foot towers if, one day, he can hang with Cirque du Soleil
By BRYAN CHU, Staff writer
ALBANY -- All of us, as we were growing up, probably heard these words from our moms: "Don't play with fire" and "Get down from there."
Brandon Birchak, a junior diver at the College of Saint Rose,
must not have been paying attention.
Birchak is a one-meter and three-meter diver for the Golden
Knights who will compete today in the Division II NCAA diving
championships. And while competing gets his heart pumping, Birchak
said, it's nothing compared with how he spends his spare time.
The 21-year-old, a Shaker High graduate, juggles and performs in
diving shows. It's not uncommon for Birchak, who started juggling
oranges last winter, to entertain street crowds by juggling 15-inch
machetes and lit torches. He says he does it just to earn a few
dollars. He also can juggle on a unicycle, on a tight rope and
hanging upside down like a bat.
"Juggling fire, it's cool, it's fun," Birchak said. "The first
time I did it, I told my friend to tackle me if I light myself on
fire."
For the record, he said he's never burned or cut himself.
He's used his diving skills to perform in more than 1,100 shows in
the past three summers. He's typically in four shows a day for
sometimes seven days a week. Birchak has performed in front of
thousands at such water and amusement parks as Great Escape in Lake
George, Cedar Point in Ohio and Gulf World in Florida. Sometimes he
dives from a height of 80 feet into a pool no deeper than eight
feet.
Asked which gets his blood churning more, a diving show or a meet
like the NCAA championships, Birchak had trouble with the
comparison.
"Winning a really, really big meet is incredibly exciting, but
jumping off of 80 feet is pure terror," he said. "They're
completely different sensations, but they're both really fun.
"I've been in some big meets and I've never had that many people
cheer for me," as compared with diving shows, he said.
Saint Rose coach Keith Murray said most divers hold second jobs as
lifeguards. Birchak has moved on from that.
"Most kids aren't driven like Birchak," Murray said. "Brandon has
that experience and he's not afraid to step outside the box."
Birchak said he hopes some day to perform in Cirque du Soleil.
He's well on his way. This summer, Birchak will be performing on
the Russian Swing -- a huge pendulum that catapults divers 30 feet
into the air and into a body of water -- in Indiana Beach, Ind.
Birchak, who said all of the show divers he's encountered are
current or ex-collegians, is succeeding despite a rash of injuries
in his career.
"I broke my back twice, had five serious concussions, broke my
ankle, fractures in both wrists, shoulders and knees. I was a
mess," said Birchak, who transferred to Saint Rose from from
Division I Southern Illinois. "I went in for a body scan, and the
doctor asked me if I had been hit by a car."
Asked what his parents think of his high-risk pastimes, he just
laughed.
"My mom is probably rolling her eyes and shaking her head at these
less than safe activities," Birchak said.
