Diving Grand Prix, Day 2, Gold Coast: China's wall hard to topple

Chinese divers have continued to dominate the early rounds of the FINA Diving Grand Prix on the Gold Coast, but Australia’s female springboard divers have shown they are in strong medal contention this weekend.

24-year-old Han Wang was pushed all the way in a high-scoring 3-metre semi-final by Australia’s Esther Qin and Maddison Keeney.

And China’s 17-year-old Xiaohu Tai might not have everything his own way in the men’s platform final, after being pushed by teammate Zigan Huang.

Wang was impressive as she chases her first 2015 Grand Prix win.

She finished with 350.15, just ahead of Australia’s Qin on 342.35.

“I did quite well in the semi finals, but during the preliminaries I didn’t do so well,” Wang said.

“For all the Chinese divers there are many competitions year round. There are also long training sessions, so we are a bit tired.

“But we need to adjust our conditions all the time to stay at a competitive level.”

Qin, the gold medalist at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, said she wasn’t distracted by the quality of the field.

“I didn’t think about the other divers, I just focused on myself,” Qin said.

“I’m very scared to dive in the outdoor pool, I’m really struggling with the wind.”

Maddison Keeney was initially not listed to dive in the individual event, but repaid the faith of the selectors with a polished performance.

“I’ve been training with the mindset of only doing synchro, so having to do individual at the last moment was pretty hard,” Keeney said.

“I’ve been really hard on myself, trying to get myself up to scratch. I was really happy with my semi-final.”

Another Chinese diver, Lin Qu, won the first semi-final with 301.85.

Xiaohu Tai is also chasing his first Grand Prix win of the year.

“I’m quite happy with my performance today,” Tai said.

“I haven’t been training so much during normal training. For all the divers it’s the same, you have to dive indoors and outdoors. It’s just about getting used to the conditions.”

Tai finished on 454.25 points, with teammate Zigan Huang posting 442.65.

The next closest diver in the men’s platform was Malaysia’s Yiwei Chew, on 390.05.

The men’s 3-metre and women’s platform finals will be contested on Saturday, along with the first of the synchro finals – the men’s 3-metre, women’s 10-metre and the 10-metre mixed.