Chinese divers dominate, win four golds
Chinese divers dominate, win four golds
The hosts have four gold medals from eight events with more expected.

Beijing: World champions Wang Feng and Qin Kai won the men's synchronised 3m springboard title here on Wednesday as the hosts continued their domination of the event with their fourth straight gold in Beijing's diving pool.

While US star Michael Phelps is on the verge of making history in the Water Cube's pool, China are sweeping aside all rivals next door in the diving and now have four golds from the competition's eight events with more expected.

"We have real depth in our teams and in a very short period of time we have brought a lot of athletes in from the different provinces," said Wang when asked why Chinese divers seem to have no real rivals at this Olympics.

"We have vigorous training everyday and with a lot of hard work we have managed to achieve these good results."

This was China's most comprehensive diving victory of the games so far.

The Chinese pair won with a huge margin by finishing with 469.08 points compared to the 421.98 of Russian silver medallists Dmitri Sautin and Yury Kunakov.

Ukrainian pair Illya Kvasha and Oleksiy Prygorov took bronze with 415.05.

In front of packed crowds of passionate fans, the Chinese have led all four dive competitions this week from start to finish.

Schoolgirls Wang Xin and Chen Roulin won the women's synchronised 10-metre platform on Tuesday, teenagers Lin Yue and Huo Liang took the men's synchronised 10-metre platform gold on Monday.

And Guo Jingjing and Wu Minxia cleaned up Sunday's women's 3m synchronised springboard event last Sunday, China's dive queen Guo is expected to claim another gold in Sunday's women's 3m individual springboard final.

On Wednesday, Qin and Wang made up for the disappointment of their last place in the same competition four years ago when the hot favourites in Athens came last.

And the gold had an extra sparkle for Wang, who dedicated his medal to his wife, having finished fourth in the men's individual 3m springboard in Athens.

Just as their compatriots had done, Wang and Qin led from the first of their six dives and built up a commanding lead.

Having claimed gold in the FINA World Cup in February, the pair started with a hiss and a roar at the Water Cube by scoring three perfect ten marks from the nine judges for their opening back pike.

With four rounds gone it was all over as the Chinese enjoyed a clear 20 point lead which they only extended.

Despite US pair Chris Colwill and Jevon Tarantino stumbling on their fourth round dive which put them sixth, the Americans recovered to claim fourth.

Canada's Alexandre Despatie, who made Commonwealth Games history as the competition's youngest gold medal winner at Kuala Lumpur in 1998 aged just 13, finished a disappointing fifth with partner Arturo Miranda.

What's your reaction?

Comments

https://umorina.info/assets/images/user-avatar-s.jpg

0 comment

Write the first comment for this!