More diving gold for Team China at Asian Swimming Championships

There were two more gold medals for China on the second day of diving events at the Asian Swimming Championships yesterday.
Picking up from where his teammates left off Thursday, it was China’s Zhou Xin who topped the podium in the men’s 3m springboard final with a points total of 480.25. Despite an under-par performance on his fifth round dive (an inward 3.5 somersault tuck) Xin led the competition throughout the six rounds to emerge a worthy winner of the gold.
Malaysia’s Tze Liang Ooi claimed the silver with a total of 440.50 points, and Hong Kong’s Xie Zhen the bronze with 420.75. This was Ooi’s second silver medal of the competition so far, having claimed second spot with partner Chew Yiwei in yesterday’s 3m synchro event yesterday. Yiwei finished fifth in today’s individual event.
China’s other gold medal of the day came in the women’s 10m synchro final in which 14-year-olds Xing Yiying and Wang Wenna emerged as champions. Xing was a silver medallist in yesterday’s individual 10m platform, behind teammate Wu Shengping. But yesterday, the total of 315.21 she amassed with partner Weng was enough for gold. Japan’s Yuka Mabuchi and Fuka Tatsumi took silver with 240.72 and Zhiayi Loh and Hoong Cheong Jun of Malaysia the bronze with 230.82 points.
The Malaysians outscored the field with their first dive, but could not maintain the consistency to keep them in top spot.
“Actually we were hoping for a silver today but we had fun and enjoyed the competition,” said Jun afterwards.
“The Chinese divers’ degree of difficulty is higher than ours and we were just doing our fixed dives for every dive, so it is tough to compete with them,” added Jun who will also compete in the 3m synchro and individual 3m events.
“We’re excited for those competitions and we’ll try to do as well as we can. We’ll just try to be more optimistic for the next events and hopefully get the silver.”
Diving action continues today with the final of the men’s 10m synchro at 2:30 P.M. and the women’s 3m springboard final at 3:30 p.m.