Wang Zongyuan won his second consecutive world title in the men’s 3m diving on Thursday. In a tight contest for silver, 19-year-old Osmar Olvera Ibarra beat China’s Long Daoyi on his last dive to bring Mexico its sixth diving medal in Fukuoka.
After a shaky first dive on the men’s 3m springboard on Thursday, China’s defending world champion Wang Zongyuan built an insurmountable lead over the next three rounds to score 538.10 points and claim a 10th gold medal for China in diving this week.
But perfection was elusive on Thursday.
The silver medalist, Osmar Olvera Ibarra of Mexico, was in seventh place at one point, and the bronze medalist, Long Daoyi, reincarnated himself from 11th place (of 12 divers) up to the podium.
Yet the thrill of the night was Olvera’s finish. He had saved his three most difficult dives for last and outscored everyone on the last two, including the most difficult dive of the night, a forward 2½ with 3 twists that scored 99.45 points – far more than he needed to breeze past Long, who held a seven-tenths of a point edge going into the last round.
Olvera said in a separate interview on Monday that to beat China, he needed to compete more and “be out there more” so the judges knew him better.
They sure know him now! Thursday marked the second time this week that Olvera Ibarra had split up a pair of Chinese divers on a world championship podium. In addition to preventing China from taking the top two places in the 3m event, the 19-year-old from Mexico prevented China from finishing 1-2 in the 1m event four days earlier.
After Olvera Ibarra earned 507.50 points to claim his second silver medal in Fukuoka, he said, “I never had any doubt that I would be able to take home a medal today. I just tried to rely on all the training that I did for this competition. I have been training for so many days and so many hours for this moment alone, and now it has all borne fruit!”
Mexico has no earned six medals at these world championships – more than any other nation besides China.
After Wang, 21, won the 3m gold medal to keep China’s unbeaten streak alive in his second and final event in Japan, he said his lighter load this year made it “a bit easier” than last year’s world championships where he delivered gold in all three events he contested. Wang also revealed that when he was younger, he thought about quitting diving because it took him away from his family.
“I missed my mom and dad so [much],” he said. “But I will keep going till the end. We have two more days to go. I will be there for my team members.”
That means that in the women’s 3m springboard event (the only final on Friday), Wang will be cheering on Chen Yiwen who will try to defend her 2022 title and Chang Yani who will try to improve upon her 2022 bronze. China has not lost the women’s 3m title at the world championships since 1998, seven years before either of them was born.