SILVER SWIMMER
Penny Oleksiak, 16, of Canada reacts after winning the silver medal in the women’s 100-metre butterfly final, at the Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on Sunday. See full coverage in Sports
There was wind, a sprinkling of rain, an unexplained delay while the Canadians stood on their springboards, waiting to be called for their fourth of five dives.
A motorcade, complete with cops and their ever-present flashing lights and sirens — evidently someone missed the memo — raced by on the street just a few metres the other side of the blue mesh TV backdrop that separates the diving tower from the traffic.
Jennifer Abel and Pamela Ware said they weren’t aware of any of it. They were focused. But their diving, on the day that matters after a quadrennial of training, was not.
Sitting in third place after four dives, with the Olympic bronze medal there for the taking, Abel slightly over-rotated her forward two-and-a-half somersault and single twist, and her lower body passed vertical — and the resulting splash doused the last hope for the Canadian synchronized three-metre springboard duo Sunday afternoon at the open-air Centro Aquatico Maria Lenk.
It wasn’t a certainty until the marks came up, but “you know when you’ve missed a dive,” said Abel, the 24-year-old Montrealborn bronze medallist (with Emilie Heymans) in London four years ago.
“We knew we were (in third), we knew it was possible, but unfortunately I missed my last dive, so that’s what cost us our bronze medal today.”
She apologized to her partner after the marks made it official that they had lost the bronze.
“But she shouldn’t have because we’re a team,” said Ware, 23, “and I missed one, too.”
The gold medal was unavailable because Wu Minxia was diving for China, and now it’s four Olympics in a row the 30-yearold has won at least one gold medal, a record five in all — this time with partner Shi Tingmao.
“I thought about giving up before these Olympic Games because I got injured for a month and I thought it would take a lot of time to recover,” said Wu, who said she would “probably” retire after Rio.
“It’s hard to explain how much effort you need to put into this training process. It’s not easy.”
They only make it look that way. Watching the Chinese is like seeing a whole different sport from the one everybody else is doing.
The second flight, then, was a battle among Italians Francesca Dallape and Tania Cagnotto — who stayed comfortably in second throughout — Malaysia, Canada and Great Britain. The Aussies, Anabelle Smith and Maddison Keeney, came through on their final dive to nip the Canadians for the bronze by less than a point: 299.19 to 298.32.
Abel and Ware weren’t happy with their first two dives, had to work their way back from seventh place after the first one, and on the fourth, it was Ware who went past vertical, so all around it wasn’t a banner day.
The instant they hit the water on the fifth dive, “I kind of knew it was probably over,” Abel said, “but at the time you always think …”
“There’s always a little hope,” Ware said. “I’m really proud of what we did even though we didn’t get the medal. We have four more years to work up to another medal.”
“We’re still fourth at the Olympic Games. How many people can say that? Not a lot,” Abel said. “I just said I’m sorry because I can do better. We’ve been bronze medallist at so many competitions, so yes, today, we are sad, but tomorrow is a different day.”
Both Abel and Ware still have the individual three-metre springboard competition next weekend.
I’m really proud of what we did even though we didn’t get the medal.