Skip to content

Canada's Ware wins bronze in 3-metre springboard at diving Grand Prix

Ware wins bronze in 3-metre springboard

GATINEAU, Que. — Pamela Ware of Greenfield Park, Que., capture a bronze medal in the women's three-metre springboard final on Saturday at the Canada Cup, a FINA Diving Grand Prix event.

Ware, a 2016 Olympian, scored 311.90 points in her first competition since returning from injury.  

"I'm really, really happy because coming here, to be honest, I wasn't the most confident," said the 24-year-old. "It's been three weeks that I've been doing my competition dives."

Ware had surgery for a stress fracture in her left foot in December of 2016. She returned to training only six weeks ago.

"In one week my confidence has boosted so much," said Ware.

Dongjin Jia of China won the gold medal with 361.05 points, followed by Australia's Anabelle Smith who scored 317.35 points after five dives.

Ware's success followed a silver-medal performance by Canada's Vincent Riendeau in the men's 10-metre platform.

The 20-year-old from Pointe-Claire, Que., scored 457.25 points in the final with his refreshed list of dives for the 2017 season.

"I'm happy with the three new dives that I'm doing this year, they went pretty well in the competition today," said Riendeau.

The 2016 Olympian was beaten by Jian Yang of China, who topped the field with 550.60 points. Yang's forward 4 1/2 somersaults from the pike position carries a degree of difficulty of 4.1, and the judges gave him 104.55 points for his efforts.

Riendeau's highest degree of difficulty is 3.6. He has two dives at that level on his list.

Riendeau said he feels he is gaining comfort with his execution.

"This definitely gives me a bit of insight on how I should approach the competition in Windsor (the fourth stop on the Diving World Series later this month) to finish off the World Series and also for the World Championships in the summer," he said.

Great Britain's Matthew Dixon was third with 446.25 points.

In the women's synchro 10-metre, Canada's Meaghan Benfeito and Caeli McKay were fourth with 280.26 points. Xin Liu and Rui Zhang collected the gold medal with 324.36 points.

Sunday is the final day of competition in Gatineau. The program will include the women's synchro springboard and individual platform, the men's synchro platform and individual springboard plus the mixed synchro springboard event.

The Canadian Press