Zhou, China's first Olympic diving champion, said that she was especially satisfied with the women's 10-meter platform event at the World Cup.

"Chen Ruolin and Wang Xin showed their talent in the final," said Zhou. "It was a high level competition, and our divers performed quite well."

Teenagers Chen and Wang were the winner and runner-up respectively in the final, and they paired up to clinch the women's 10-meter platform synchronized gold as well.

Zhou also warned that Chinese divers should keep a cool head because some foreign divers impressed her very much.

Yahel Castillo of Mexico, 21, only 0.30 points behind world champion Qin Kai in the men's three-meter springboard final to take the bronze. The difficulty degree of the 21-year-old's one dive was the highest during the final, and he also got the highest score in the dive.

"I saw Castillo in last September's World Series in Nanjing, and by then he had not learned the dive," Zhou said. "He learned it in recent months and performed it with high quality and consistency, which shows his talent and strength in diving."

Zhou also complimented 14-year-old Thomas Daley of Britain, who took the bronze in the men's 10m platform synchronized event.

"The difficulty degree of his dives has increased a lot since the last time I saw him in England," said Zhou. "He really has some talent and made a lot progress in the past year."

Zhou said that the German Sascha Klein will be a hard challenger for Chinese divers.

Klein beat Chinese Zhou Luxin and Lin Yue to clinch the men's 10-meter platform gold on Sunday.

(Xinhua News Agency February 25, 2008)