China's Chen, Quan finish 1-2 in women's 10m platform at Budapest worlds

BUDAPEST - China's Chen Yuxi and Quan Hongchan finished one-two in the women's 10m platform final on the 10th competition day of the 19th FINA World Championships here on Monday.

The 16-year-old Chen, Olympic champion of the women's 10m platform sychonized pairing Zhang Jiaqi, defend her world title with 417.25 points, 0.3 ahead of her compatriot Quan, who is one year younger.

Malaysia's Pandelela Pamg bagged a bronze with 338.85 points.

"I did not notice the point gap between me and Hongchan. I don't focus on that but always on my moves and acts," Chen told Xinhua following her victory.

"It's not a perfect show for me, especially since I did not finish well in the last two dives. I could be better," she added.

Chen further explained: "It feels very different to defend the title. When I won the gold for the first time in 2019, I didn't have any special feeling. But following my experience at the Olympics, I started to know how much this means to me."

She will pair with the 10m platform Olympic champion Quan in the 10m synchronized, with whom they are both partners and rivals. According to Chen, competition will motivate both of them to become better.

"We'll take it as motivation instead of pressure and it will show the best of us in the synchro," she said.

"I did not finish good in my third dive of 207C. It happened both during the preliminaries and the semis," Quan commented. "I think I need more training to improve this."

She admitted that she did feel pressure as an Olympic champion.

"So many people are watching my performance. So many Chinese fans cheering for me. During the competition, I might have one moment thinking too much, but after the third dive, I'm all coming back mentally. In general, I'm feeling good this time," Quan said.

She was just over 14 years old (130 days) when she won the women's 10m platform at last year's Tokyo Olympic Games. She was the second youngest to win an Olympic title in this event, following China's Fu Mingxia at Barcelona 1992 at 13 years and 346 days.

Only two female divers have won the world title of 10m platform as the reigning Olympic champion: Ulrika Knape-Lindberg (Sweden) in 1973 and Fu in 1994.

This is the second gold for Chinese divers at the Budapest worlds since Cao Yuan and Wang Zongyuan won the men's 3m synchronized on Sunday.

Earlier on Monday, Wang and Cao ended on top of the men's 3m springboard semifinals with 547.95 and 482.50 points respectively.