Montréal, May 6, 2023 – Caeli McKay and Kate Miller got off to a strong start in the women’s 10-metre synchro final at the Montréal World Cup diving competition, but it was their third trip to the tower that halted the duo’s momentum on Saturday. At the end of the day, the Canadians finished in fifth place with a total of 286.08 points.

China’s Hongchan Quan and Yuxi Chen dominated the second stop on the world cup circuit with 378.60 points, to edge out Britain’s Andrea Spendolini Sirieix and Lois Toulson who took home silver, (316.68 points) and Germany’s Christina Wassen and Elena Wassen who had to settle for bronze (302.58 points).

“We missed two dives (third and fourth), that’s sometimes life in diving competitions. It happens,” acknowledged McKay, a Calgary native. “I think we learned a lot from the mistakes we made today; we need to practice a little bit more, get more comfortable with each other and with our own dives,” continued the Olympian, adding that she had a lot of fun with her new teammate, and enjoyed cheers from the crowd.

Less accustomed to diving on the international scene, Kate Miller was confident going into the competition, even though it was her first-ever first World Cup. “I felt good in training and I was ready to get to the podium, but that’s not always how it works. I’m going to learn from today for the next competition,” explained the Ottawa diver.

On her third dive, Miller had too many rotations which cost her points, and so her team slipped from second to seventh in the provisional standings. That’s when veteran McKay took Miller under her wing to keep her on track.

“Caeli is the best person to give me advice. She knows a lot about synchro events,” said Miller, the younger of the duo.

Nevertheless, the duo’s first appearance on the international stage is a good sign, according to Caeli McKay. “We showed that we’re resilient. We made honest mistakes, and ones we can learn from. We know what we need to do and to finish strong with our last dive gives us a lot of confidence. On that dive, we handled our stress very well after two not-so-great dives.”

Ware and Vallée – finalists

Earlier Saturday, Pamela Ware and Mia Vallée secured their spots in Sunday’s 3-metre final with second and fifth finishes, respectively, in the preliminaries. Calgarian Margo Erlam finished 15th, blocking her from the top-12 final.

“I had a cold last week and wasn’t back to 100% yet, but the crowd gave me a boost to get excited, even if everything didn’t turn in my favour today (Saturday),” commented the 20-year-old athlete, taking part for the first time in a competition held on Canada.

In the men’s 10m, Nathan Zsombor-Murray placed fifth, and will also be a finalist on Sunday; diving in the same event, Rylan Wiens had to withdraw due to a neck injury suffered earlier this week.

There were no Canadians in the men’s 3M synchro final.

The Montréal World Cup comes to a close Sunday with five finals on the schedule: women’s three-metre, men’s three-metre, women’s 10-metre, men’s 10-metre as well as the mixed team competition in three-metre and 10-metre. Stay tuned for more thrilling diving action!.

More information :

Alexandra Piché
Manager, Communications
Diving Canada
C: 514 625-5513
alexandra@diving.ca