BARCELONA, Spain, 17 July 2003 — Emilie Heymans of Canada won gold in the women’s 10m platform diving competition at the world swimming championships here yesterday.
Heymans surged to the lead on the final round of five dives to score 597.45 points with Chinese favorites Lao Lishi and Li Na having to settle for silver and bronze respectively. Olympic runner-up Li had been leading after the first three dives but slipped to second in the fourth.
Heymans scored one maximum 10 for her final jump, a back two-and-a-half somersault one-and-a-half twist pike. Asian Games champion Lao scored 595.56, with Li scoring 563.43, former world champion Olena Zhupina of the Ukraine was fourth.
The Belgian-born Heymans becomes the second Canadian woman to win a world diving gold after Blythe Hartley in the 1m springboard two years ago, but the first on the highboard.
Italy’s Viola Valli grabbed her second gold medal when she won the women’s 10km open water race. The 31-year-old timed 1hr 59min 49.9sec in the race along the Barcelona sea front to add the title to her collection after successfully defending her 5km women’s open water title Sunday.
Germany’s Angela Mauer took silver in 1:59:51.1 with Edith van Dijk of the Netherlands taking bronze with a time of 1:59.53.0. The men’s 10km race was to take place later.
Russia’s Vladimir Diattchine claimed the men’s 10km open water gold.
Diattchine, bronze medalist over 5km on Sunday, swum the distance along the Barcelona seafront in 1hr 50min 58.8sec with Germany’s Christain Hein, having to settle for silver again after the 5km.
Hein clocked 1:51:06.5, with Spanish former world champion David Meca in third in 1:51:08.4.
Japan struck the first gold in synchronized swimming winning the inaugural free routine combination event at the world swimming championships.
In the absence of Russia, who did not compete in order to concentrate on their solo, deut and team events, Japan stole the show with an energetic and acrobatic routine to music from the Lion King which earned them 98.500 points.
The United States and hosts Spain shared joint silver with 97.333 in the event which is a combination of the solo, duet and team events all rolled into a single five-minute performance.
The Japanese team, which included Juri Tatsumi, Emiko Suzuki, Yoko Yoneda, Saho Harada, Michiyo Fujimaru, Naoko Kawashima, Chiaki Watanabe, Kanako Kitao, earned a string of 9.9s for technical merit and artistic impression.
“Team work is the reason for this medal,” said Tatsumi. “We didn’t have enough time to practice the combinations together, but when we did get together we were very focused because we knew that we only had a short time to work in,” she said.
Fujimaru added: “Our coach told us not to worry about the overall look of the performance but just to look energized and excited and that worked for us.”
