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ROME, Italy, July 24. AFTER a few days in which its supremacy in diving was tested, China has recovered with another run on the gold medals. Today, Guo Jingjing and Wu Minxia claimed the women's three-meter synchro title at the FINA World Championships.
Guo and Wu led every round en route to a 348.00-point tally for gold. The team collected three 10s from judges throughout the evening, including a pair of them from Swedish judge Mathz Lindberg on the opening and closing dives. China's final dive gained 81.90 points to salt away the victory.
Italy's Tania Cagnotto and Francesca Dallape gave the home crowd something to cheer for with a silver-medal performance. The Italians totaled 329.70 points, including a run of three straight 70-point dives to complete the five-dive list.
Russia's Julia Pakhalina and Anastasia Pozdniakova grabbed bronze with 310.80 points. The Russians had a pair of dives clear 70 points, including a final 73.08 to complete the podium.
Canada (309.90), Australia (309.18) and the United States (305.10) rounded out the top six.
China's Huo Liang and Lin Yue dominated the men's 10-meter platform synchro preliminary round. The team tallied 480.06 points to finish more than 30 points ahead of anyone else. Huo and Lin nailed the final dive of the round to the tune of 101.46 points, and also had a 91.80-point dive to their credit in the fourth round.
Germany's Patrick Hausding and Sascha Klein qualified second with 447.24 points, while Cuba's Jose Antonio Guerra Oliva and Jeinkler Ernesto Aguirre Manso finished third in prelims with 427.38 points. The U.S. duo of David Boudia and Thomas Finchum took fourth with 426.54 points.