China's 18-year-old Xu Huiyan won the women's solo free on Saturday, earning her third gold medal at the Artistic Swimming World Cup.
China's Xu Huiyan competes in the women's solo free final of the 2024 World Artistic Swimming World Cup to be held in Beijing, China on April 6, 2024 (Xinhua News Agency/Wang Lili)
“The three gold medals really give me the motivation to move forward.This year I will continue to improve myself through world-class competitions.I want to focus on my rhythm and work hard with my partner for the women's duet free competition tomorrow. ” he said. She Xu won the women's solo technical title and team technical title on Friday.
Xu won the women's solo free skate with an outstanding performance, beating second place Isabel Cui (Spain) with a difference of 33.5188 points, and Marloes Steenbeek (Netherlands) won the bronze medal. .
“I started artistic swimming when I was 8 years old, and at first I practiced about 3 hours a week, then gradually practiced 3 hours a day. I was looking forward to showing myself in the water cube at the Olympic venue. China My relatives also came to support me,'' said Cui, who was born in Spain and whose parents are Chinese.
In the team free event, the only event in which the host country's top swimmers participate at the Beijing World Cup, China easily defeated Australia and won the gold medal with 343.3479 points.
27-year-old China's Wang Liyi said, “The World Cup is an important step towards the Paris Olympics. Today's team showed a great performance. Also, as an experienced athlete, I want to encourage our young swimmers to work hard. I encouraged them to practice and prepare for the next competition.” ”
China's Lin Yanhan and Lin Yanjun won the women's duet technical, while Spain and Slovakia took silver and bronze medals, respectively.
Chinese team coach Li Ming was satisfied with the twins' performance, saying, “This is the first time they are participating in such a high-level competition. We achieved our goal at the World Cup. Technically They believed they could do more.” And we will continue to make progress. ”
Filippo Perati (Italy) won the gold medal in the men's solo free. Spain's Jordi Caceres Iglesias and Kazakhstan's Victor Dolzin came in second and third respectively.
Approximately 100 elite artistic swimmers from 14 teams from around the world will compete in 11 events. China has so far won six of the eight gold medals scheduled for the World Cup.
The final competition day will be held on Sunday with women's duet free, mixed duet free and team acrobatic.
