Penza, 10 September 2014. PenzaNews. Alexander Belevtsev, a member of the Russian sports team, won a silver medal in 3-meter springboard diving among juniors aged 16-18 at the world diving championship. The competition took place in Penza sports palace “Burtasy” on Tuesday, September 9.
12 athletes from the USA, Germany, Poland, Mexico, New Zealand, China and Russia took part in the final stage of the competition.
Each athlete had to perform five diving attempts.
After three rounds, in the overall standings a group of four leaders came in view. The first place went to the sportsmen of China — Huang Bowen and Tai Xiaou, followed by Alexander Belevtsev and Ilya Molchanov (Russia).
The turning point was when Tai Xiaou poorly executed the fourth dive. It gave the Russian athletes an opportunity to overcome him, and the leader had a chance to increase the gap significantly.
The third and second places were secured after the fifth dive. Ilya Molchanov made a serious mistake, and ended up with a result of 540.60 points, shifting down to the fourth place. Bronze went to Diego Rodrigo from Mexico, who went above him by 21.7 points.
Alexander Belevtsev brilliantly executed the fifth attempt, ending the competition with a score of 565.60 points, but he failed to catch up with Huang Bowen. The Chinese athlete became the champion with 636.60 points.
Commenting on his performance after the awards ceremony, Alexander Belevtsev reported that he managed to enter the top three winners thanks to his psychological stability.
“The guys made mistakes, but I, on the contrary, felt confident. When I realized that I could take the silver, I simply did everything as planned. This way, I proved myself and the guys that even though the Chinese are considered the leaders, you can and must compete with them. We'll train harder to win in the future,” the Internet service “” quoted the athlete.
