Big dives in the fifth and sixth rounds helped both Americans Carson Tyler (10th) and Andrew Capobianco (15th) move on to the semifinals of the men's diving 3m springboard competition at the Paris Olympics. They finished the preliminary round in 10th and 15th, respectively, with the top 18 divers moving on to the semifinals.
The entire field spent the morning chasing China's Wang Zongyuan and Xie Siyi. Wang, who won gold in Paris in the synchro springboard event, was the only diver on Tuesday to score at least 80 points on all six dives. His final dive scored 95.00 to finish his day with a score of 530.65, 21 points better than Xie. Xie came to Paris as the defending gold medalist in this event. He scored 79.2 and 77.4 on his second and third dives, but finished his day with a dive scoring 96.9, tied for the highest scoring dive of anyone. His score of 509.60 was 41 points better than third.
Great Britain's duo of Jack Laugher and Jordan Houlden finished the day third and fourth, followed by Mexico's Osmar Olvera. Olvera previously won silver in the synchro springboard event in Paris, and Laugher won bronze in that event. Both divers also had dives receive scores of 96.9.
In the preliminary round on Tuesday, both Americans were tied for seventh after the first dives, but struggled over the next three rounds. In the third round, Tyler performed his lowest degree of difficulty dive, but went past vertical and received a score of just 58.9. Capobianco also had a big splash on his reverse 3 1/2 and scored just 52.50. They were 17th and 18th after three dives, dangerously close to the cutoff.
The fourth round was an even bigger struggle for both U.S. divers. Tyler received his lowest score of the day, a 48.00, and Capobianco under rotated his back 3 1/2 and scored just 36.00. Both dropped out of the top 18, Tyler falling to 19th and Capobianco to 21st.
The final two rounds went much better for the Americans. In his fourth dive, Tyler performed a reverse 3 1/2 tuck that scored 73.5, his highest score of the day, and moved up to 15th. On his final dive a reverse 1 1/2 with 3 1/2 twists. He overcame a bad start and finished strong. He moved up nine places in two dives and finished the day 10th to move on to the semifinal.
Capobianco, an Olympic silver medalist at the 2020 Games in the synchro springboard and fourth place finisher at this year's world championship, also had a slight takeoff mistake on his fifth dive but had a good finish to score 76.05 and move up to 19th. On his final jump, he performed a forward 4 1/2 that scored 79.8, his best score of the day, to move him into 15th and on to the semifis.
The full list of 18 divers moving on to the semifinals is listed below. The semifinals of the men's springboard will be held on Wednesday at 4 a.m. ET. Scores will reset to zero for the next round.
Divers moving on
- Wang Zongyuan (China) 530.65
- Xie Siyi (China) 509.60
- Jack Laugher (Great Britain) 468.30
- Joran Houlden (Great Britain) 448.20
- Osmar Olvera (Mexico) 444.15
- Jules Bouyer (France) 407.30
- Lorenzo Marsaglia (Italy) 405.05
- Kurtis Mathews (Australia) 399.20
- Moritz Wesemann (Germany) 398.70
- Carson Tyler (USA) 389.80
- Sho Sakai (Japan) 389.15
- Woo Haram (South Korea) 389.10
- Gwendal Bisch (France) 387.00
- Yona Knight-Wisdom (Jamaica) 382.90
- Andrew Capobianco (USA) 382.05
- Yi Jaegyeon (South Korea) 381.40
- Luis Uribe (Colombia) 375.90
- Jonatha Ruvalcaba (Dominican Republic) 362.05