Team China dominated the second day of the 2018 FINA Artistic Swimming World Series in Beijing by taking three of the four golds at stakes, including mixed technical routine, free combination and team free today, Saturday April 21.

The host team performed a routine entitled “the stormy ocean” in the Free Combination for a total of 93.2667 and collected their third medal of the tournament.

 

Slovakia and Macao came second and third, respectively.

"We made our free combination more compact and difficult since we reduced 30 seconds as FINA rule required. The speed and power are very important elements in the world of artistic swimming. So, we tried to make more efforts on that. I am pleased with my young swimmers," China's Head Coach Wang Jie said.

In the Team Free routine, China won with a big margin, scoring 92.2333 points, beating the second-place USA (80.5000). Uzbekistan came third 77.7000.

 

"It is our first time in China and first time in the FINA World Series. We were junior team and just competed in the senior event for the first time. We are taking part in this event to prepare for the World Junior Artistic Championships to be held in Budapest this summer, " said the American swimmer Anna Ramirez.

During the morning session, China's pair Shi Haoyu/Zhang Yiyao took the title of the Mixed Duet Technical routine.

"We are new partners that just stated to train together four months ago. We did better than what we did in the first leg of the World Series in France. I am 5cm taller, heavier and more powerful than I was last year when I competed at the Worlds in last July. I will continue to learn from the world’s top level swimmers," said Shi, who competed in Budapest worlds for the first time.

The only gold that went to a non-Chinese swimmer was in the Solo Free, as Toshkhujaeva Khonzodakhon of Uzbekistan claimed the victory with 81.9333 points.

 

Nada Daabousova of Slovakia took the silver (80.8667) and Hua Wei Gan of Malaysia came third in (78.5000).

The World Series comes to an end on Sunday April 22 after the Mixed Free, Duet Free and Highlights events