SHANGHAI, China — Canada’s Roseline Filion took fifth place on the women’s 10-metre tower Friday, a career best performance at the FINA World Cup diving competition.
Chinese divers finished 1-2 with Xiaohui Huang first at 373.60 and Huixia Liu second 354.35. Melissa Wu of Australia was third at 349.50, and Tonia Couch of Britain was fourth at 330.90. Filion followed at 327.45.
Filion’s fifth place finish was a frustrating one for the two-time Olympian who was enjoying a career-year on the individual tower. She finished in the top-five including two medal performances in all five FINA World Series events this year and earned a silver at a FINA Grand Prix.
“It wasn’t a good representation of my season tonight,” said the Laval, Que., native. “I was feeling very confident and I was excited about showing the fruits of all my efforts. It’s disappointing not to be on the podium.”
The women’s 10-metre synchro was held on Thursday with Filion and Meaghan Benfeito of Montreal winning bronze. Over two days, the Canadians did five rounds of dives for 25 dives total.
Benfeito, also a medal contender, took ninth spot on Friday at 316.05.
In the men’s three-metre semifinal, Francois Imbeau-Dulac of St-Lazare, Que., was 18th and Cody Yano of Edmonton was 28th. Neither advanced to Saturday’s final.
Imbeau-Dulac, 13th at the 2012 Olympics, was forced to make some major technical adjustments this year due to a hip injury.
“This was not the result I wanted and it shows I still have a lot of work to do,” he said. “The good news is that I don’t feel any pain now in my hip and back. I’m confident that these changes are going to work out for me.”