Diving in to the history books: Chinese synchro star Zi picks up golden hat-trick
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UPDATED:
16:22 GMT, 29 July 2012
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China’s Wu Minxia secured her place in Olympic history with a hat-trick of springboard synchro titles alongside He Zi at Sunday’s opening diving event at the Aquatics Centre.
Wu cemented her place as one of the greatest female divers of all time as she also drew level with former synchro partner Guo Jingjing, who she teamed up with to win the past two Olympic crowns, with a record six medals at the Games.
The 26-year-old is set to surpass that mark next week, when she and He go head-to-head in the individual springboard.
Solid gold: He Zi and Wu Minxia with their medals
This afternoon they were comfortable winners, leading after all five rounds to finish with a gap of 24.30 points from nearest rivals Abigail Johnston and Kelci Bryant from the United States.
Canada’s Emilie Heymans and Jennifer Abel took bronze to ensure Heymans became the first diver to win a medal at four consecutive Olympics.
British duo Becky Gallantree and Alicia Blagg had to be content with seventh place in the eight-team final as a couple of errors cost them after being fourth after two rounds.
The plunge: Minxia (left) and He Zi (right)
The City of Leeds pair both missed their third dive, a front two-and-a-half somersaults, before 15-year-old Olympic debutant Blagg came out too late on the final dive to leave them down the rankings.
'We were really happy with the first two dives but then I missed my last dive and my third,' said Blagg.
'It was my first Games, it was just an absolutely incredible experience. The whole crowd was incredible.
In sync: The Chinese pair in flight
'Hopefully I’ve got many more Games in me to improve on this and the dives I’m not confident on.'
While small sections of the 17,500 capacity Aquatics Centre were left empty the duo still enjoyed a boisterous home support that Gallantree, competing at her second Olympics, admitted she was blown away by.
'It was absolutely incredible. The crowd out there was just mind-blowing. It was really, really fantastic,' the 27-year-old said.
'It just made us smile. We were grinning at each other.The result could have been better but there were a lot of positives in there.'