Russians clinch synchronised diving gold

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Sydney: Triple Olympic diving champion Fu Mingxia was beaten for gold in the first-ever Olympic synchronised diving competition as Russia claimed the first two titles on Saturday.

Fu opened her third Olympic campaign with silver with Chinese partner Guo Jingjing in the women's three-metre springboard event behind Russia's European champions Vera Ilyina and Yulia Pakhalina.

Olympic highboard champion Dmitry Sautin and Igor Lukashin then claimed the men's synchronised platform title for Russia ahead of China's Hu Jia and Tian Liang.

Ilyina and Pakhalina, who won the European title in Helsinki in July, took control from the start and won the five-dive event by more than 11 points from Fu and Guo, with Ukrainians Anna Sorokina and Olena Zhupina, the 1999 European champions, bronze medallists more than 30 points behind the Chinese duo.

Ilyina and Pakhalina collected four maximum 10-point scores, three for their second round back dive, and amassed an aggregate 332.64 points. Fu and Guo, who picked up one 10 on their last dive, scored 321.60 and Sorokina and Zhupina 290.34.

Pakhalina, who was banned for two months after testing positive for caffeine and missed the 1999 European championships because of it, won the 1998 world title with a different partner, Irina Lashko.

World champion at 12

Fu, who won her first world 10-metre platform title at the age of 12 in Perth, retired after winning the highboard and three-metre springboard titles at the 1996 Atlanta Games, but returned to competition at the 1999 World University Games in Palma on her way to her third Olympics.

Fu won the 1992 platform gold in the Barcelona Games and in Atlanta achieved the first Olympic diving double by a woman since German Ingrid Kraemer at the 1960 Rome Games when she won both three-metre springboard and 10-metre highboard titles. She won the platform title at the 1991 and 1994 world championships.

On the men's highboard, Sautin and Lukashin seized the initiative in the first round with a pair of forward 1- somersault dives which netted them three maximum 10 scores for synchronisation.

The Chinese pair hit back and moved three points in front in the third round with a superbly executed pair of inward 3- somersaults, which brought them one 10 and the day's highest individual dive score of 88.32.

But Sautin and Lukashin reclaimed the lead in the next round and held it in the last to win gold with a total of 365.04 points, leaving Hu and Tian with the silvers (358.74).

Experienced Germans Jan Hempel and Heiko Meyer, the 1999 European champions, took the bronze medals with 338.88, just holding off Britons Leon Taylor and Peter Waterfield (335.34).



(c) Reuters Limited.