Diving Canada – Jennifer Abel added two bronze medals to her weekend collection on Saturday, one from women’s 3m springboard, and another with François Imbeau-Dulac in mixed 3m synchro springboard, at the season opening FINA Diving World Series event in Beijing, China.

Abel, from Laval, Que., also won bronze on Friday with Mélissa Citrini-Beaulieu, of St. Constant, Que., in the women’s 3m synchro springboard, giving the Olympian three podiums in two days.

“I’m happy about my performances,” said Abel, who scored 354.30 points to come in third behind two Chinese divers. 

Han Wang was the silver medallist with 380.40 points, and 2016 Olympic champion Tingmao Shi won the event with 392.10 points.

FACT: The FINA Diving World Series is the most elite diving tour in the world, often including the same field as a world championships or Olympic Games.

For Abel, today’s bronze improves upon an individual fourth-place finish one year ago at the same event.

“It’s a completely different year,” said Abel, now 26 years-old, “It’s the first time I started the season with two good scores, semifinals and finals, but you can’t compare me to last year, now I know exactly where I’m going, last year was a little bit like, ‘What am I doing here, coming back from the Olympics.’”

Later on Saturday evening at Beijing’s Water Cube, Abel teamed up with Imbeau-Dulac, from Saint-Lazare, Que., to register 302.67 points, and take bronze in the synchro springboard event.

Great Britain’s Grace Reid and Tom Daley were second with 308.67 points while China’s Han Wang and Zheng Li won with 331.50 points.

For the Canadians the result matches their third-place from this event in 2017.

Imbeau-Dulac, 27, says he and Abel have a great friendship that contributes to their success.

“It’s a moment for us to have fun together and we have a very special relationship,” said the 2012 Olympian, who says he and Abel talk about so many different things during the event.

“We manage to avoid the stress of competing when we talk like that.”

Imbeau-Dulac was eighth in the men’s 3m springboard on Saturday, improving on his 11th from a year ago.

He is working on focusing on the moment in competition, “I try to understand that diving is a very important part of my life but also there are many other things,” said Imbeau-Dulac.

“I feel like it’s working, I’ve been more consistent and I feel like I’m handling the pressure much better than last year.”

Olympian Pamela Ware, of Montreal, was also in action on Saturday, she finished ninth in the women’s 3m springboard. 

Sunday is the final day of competition in Beijing with Montreal’s Meaghan Benfeito and Calgary’s Caeli McKay in the women’s 10m platform. 

Of note, Olympians Philippe Gagné and Vincent Riendeau will not compete at either of the first two FINA Diving World Series of the season (Beijing, and Fuji, Japan).

Gagné and Riendeau are maximizing their training time in preparation for a congested spring competition season that includes Commonwealth Games, two more Diving World Series events, Canada Cup, and the FINA Diving World Cup.

Full results: http://omegatiming.com/Competition?id=0001120000FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF&sport=AQ&year=2018  

For more information:

Maelle Dancause

Manager, Communications

Diving Plongeon Canada

C: 514-475-4540 | maelle@diving.ca