SA diver Julia Vincent has booked a place in the Olympic 3m springboard final.
The 29-year-old needed a top-12 finish in the semifinals to advance and made absolutely sure of her progress by finishing sixth overall with a total of 297.30 points on Thursday.
Just like in the preliminaries, Vincent’s third dive was her best – her reverse two and a half somersault pike scoring a total of 64.50.
She also produced an impressive final dive, a forward two and a half somersaults one twist pike, scoring 63.00 points to secure that sixth spot – a significant jump up from her 13th place in the preliminaries.
Vincent had said before the start of the competition that she is usually most nervous for the first round so she was caught off-guard by a few butterflies ahead of the semifinal.
“I was a little more nervous than I was expecting, just knowing what's on the line, wanting to make sure that I made the final,” she admitted afterwards. “But I also felt pretty steady. The same as yesterday, I just wanted to stay steady, survive, and advance. That's all these rounds are for so I’m pretty happy with that.”
The US-based diver said she was pleased with how she bounced back after a less-than-perfect opening dive which scored the lowest of her five with 51.00 points.
“My first dive I would call a little bit of a mess, so I was trying not to watch the scores too much until I had kind of got my rhythm again. But then towards the end, I knew I just needed something steady on my head. Nothing special, just do my dive, and I'd be good to go through.”
The focus now shifts to tomorrow’s final. While Vincent has competed in three World Championships finals, she never progressed past the preliminaries at her previous two Olympics.
Asked what her preparation will involve ahead of a first Olympic final, she reckoned: “I'll go see my family and my friends and then I'll go and rest, get some food. There's not much to do between now and the final. I think all the work has been done. So we're just resting and making sure my body is ready to go for tomorrow.”
Vincent said having her family and friends in the stadium, unlike in Tokyo where crowds were banned because of the Covid pandemic, has made all the difference.
“It's so nice to hear them in the crowd and they're doing a really good job being loud, even though there's not that many of them,” she explained. “I just love hearing that. It makes me feel like they're the only people in the crowd, which is exactly how I like it. It makes a big difference for me on the board.”
As for what her target is heading into tomorrow’s final, Vincent reckoned it would be business as usual.
“I think I'm going to try to do the same thing, stay steady. Usually when I try to do too much, that's when things go wrong, so I'm just going to almost pretend like I'm just surviving and advancing again and see how that works for me.”
The 3m springboard final is scheduled for 3pm tomorrow.
Photo credits: Anton Geyser/TeamSA