Diver Zhou Luxin reined the tower in Nanjing on Sunday, helping
powerhouse China to draw the curtain of the three-leg World Series
with another clean sweep of gold.
China had bagged home all the 16 at the first two legs of World
Series golds.
In the last event on Sunday, the 19-year-old Zhou Luxin and his
16-year-old teammate Lin Yue brought a furious showdown in the
men's ten-meter platform final.
The World Championships runner-up Zhou nailed three spectacular
dives to earn three high scores above 100 points. Lin chased
tightly in the last three rounds, but failed to hold back Zhou to
win at 582.40 points.
"I didn't care Lin's performance during the competition, but
concentrated on each of my dives," said Zhou, "I believe the
biggest rival is myself."
Lin, who won the bronze medalist in the event at Melbourne World
Championships, trailed at 575.70 points. The other two finalists
Dmitry Dobroskok from Russian and Jose Guerra of Cuba were more
than 100 points behind the Chinese aces.
Russian world champion Gleb Galperin missed the event at Nanjing
due to injury.
Earlier, neither Yuliya Pakhalina nor Wu Minxia managed to
dethrone diving queen Guo Jingjing in the women's three-meter
springboard final.
As the reigning Olympic champion and four-time world title
winner, Guo executed her five dives well enough to collect 413.60
points, leading teammate Wu with a big margin of 30.50 points.
Russia veteran Pakhalina finished third at 332.30 points.
"The three-leg diving meet finally ended," said Guo, who bagged
both the individual and synchronized golds in the springboard at
the inaugural World Series.
"It's hard to keep in form in the three-week competitions and I'
m happy to perform normally under such circumstances," said the
25-year-old diving star.
Besides, world champions Qin Kai and Wang Feng unsurprisingly
claimed their third consecutive victory in the men's three-meter
springboard synchronized event at the World Series.
The Chinese pair led the squad of five duos at 471.45 points,
followed by Erick Fornaris/Jorge Betancourt from Cuba and Canadian
Arturo Miranda/Alexandre Despatie at 424.68 and 411.06 points
respectively.
Wang Xin and Chen Ruolin were crowned in the women's ten-meter
platform synchronized event with a total score of 353.46
points.
Australian pair Melissa Wu and Briony Cole followed at 340.56
points. Canadian veteran Emilie Heymans and her partner Marie-Eve
Marleau got the third placing at 339.90 points.
The FINA Diving World Series is reserved for the cream of the
crop in the sport: the top eight from the World Championships in
the individual events and the top six in the synchronized
events.
Several divers missed the world-class events due to injury or
tiredness while Russian legend Dmitry Sautin withdrew from the last
leg competition in the last minute because of back injury.
(Xinhua News Agency September 17, 2007)