March 29, 2004
Hartley sets Canadian mark in women's 3m event
Trent Edwards
Automatic Alexandre Despatie defended his national titles for the third straight year Sunday at the Talisman Centre an hour before Blythe Hartley made a splash of her own by setting a Canadian points record in the three-metre dive.
Despatie doesn't see the senior winter national finals as competitions between himself and Canada's best divers. Neither do they.
"Alex is an incredible diver. It's to the point now where I compete for second, and I'm okay with that," said Christopher Kalec, a 23-year-old from Laval, Que.
Kalec achieved his goal in the 10-metre event Sunday, despite losing by more than 95 points to his friend, who is also from Laval.
Despatie, 18, has dominated national meets since he was 13, winning every event he's competed in except the 10-metre finals in 2001, which he lost to Kalec. In three-metre, Despatie is even better, winning every national final since 1998. That year, he also won the event in the Commonwealth Games, entering the Guinness Book of World Records as the youngest diver to win an event at a major international games.
It may seem as though Despatie, a world-wide star who has won all three international Grand Prix meets this year, is arrogant in discounting his competition. Yet Despatie's goal is to impress himself with his diving. Results are secondary.
"For me, the point's not about the colour of the medal," says Despatie. "I'm not competing to beat every other guy. I just want to do well for me."
Despatie led from start to finish Sunday afternoon, outscoring the other 11 finalists on every dive to finish with 695.13.
Kalec finished with three strong dives to take second place from Winnipeg's Kevin Geyson with 599.64 points. Geyson, 19, finished third with 540.03 points. Calgary's Erik Petursson finished sixth with 511.23 points.
Later in the afternoon, Blythe Hartley of North Vancouver, B.C., set a Canadian points record in the women's three-metre final, finishing with 621.21 points. She beat Emilie Heymans of St. Lambert, Que., who set the former record of 581.49 in 2002, by 87 points. Hartley, who decided not to compete in any other events this week to rest up for the three-metre, started with the best score posted by a woman in any event this week. Five judges awarded Hartley scores of 9.0. Hartley, 21, followed up her first splashless dive with four clean dives.
"I think it did pay off," she said. "I feel like my energy was low all week after three weeks of competing, but I woke up this morning with a lot of energy."
Heymans, 22, jumped from fifth to second place with a spectacular third dive that five judges rewarded with scores of 8.5.
tedwards@theherald.canwest.com
une page mise en ligne le 29 mars 2004 par SVP
