Chinese Teenager Diver Win 1st World Title at Swimming Worlds

Guo Jingjing Takes Women's 3m Springboard Title

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World championships and Olympic Games silver-medalist Guo Jingjing of China won the women' s three-meter springboard diving gold at the 9th FINA world swimming championships Saturday in Fukuoka.

The first ever world championships title brought tears to the eyes of the 19-year-old from the northern Chinese city of Baoding, Hebei Province. This was also China's seventh diving gold at the Fukuoka event.

Entering the final as the top qualifier, Guo led the 12-member final field throughout the five rounds of dives and collected a total of 596.67 points for the top honor. Her second dive, a reverse two and a half somersaults in pike position earned her a day-high score of 77.40 points. She had adopted the most difficult dives among the finalists, totaling at 15.2 in terms of degrees of difficulty.

World 1-meter springboard champion Irina Lashko, a 28-year-old Russian who had immigrated to Australia, was ranked only third after three rounds. But her steady performance helped her overtake the second-ranked defending champion Youlia Pakhalina from Russia after the fourth dive. Lashko took the silver medal with 552.39.