Mission Viejo : Nathan Zsombor-Murray advances to final
Nathan Zsombor-Murray of Pointe-Claire, Que., saved his best for last and advanced to the final Thursday on men’s 10-m tower at the U.S. Grand Prix diving competition.
Zsombor-Murray was ranked 14th in the preliminaries but advanced to the semis because there were four Americans in the top-12. Only two per country can proceed to the semis.
In his semifinal final heat, Zsombor-Murray improved his score by nearly a whopping 50 points with 400.05. Matthew Dixon of Britain won the heat at 428.20 and David Dinsmore of the U.S. was second at 415.70. Laurent Gosselin-Paradis of Montreal was fifth in the heat and will rank eighth overall. Randall Willars of Mexico won the other semi with 474.00.
‘’I straightened my dives out and cleaned up my entries in the semis,’’ said Zsombor-Murray, who’ll turn 16 later this month. ‘’The preliminaries were rough but I got lucky.’’
Zsombor-Murray’s best dive was his sixth and final dive, a back two and a half. He earned a 9.0, 8.5 and four 8.0’s for 76.80 points. Just before, he had muffed his reverse for 3.5’s and 4.0’s
‘’I knew I had to nail that last dive,’’ he said. ‘’I was really focused. It’s my best dive and that’s why I put it last.’’
The final is on Saturday.
On women’s three-metre, Margo Erlam of Calgary was 26th in prelims.
Competition continues through to Sunday.
Full results: https://secure.meetcontrol.com/divemeets/system/meetresultsext.php?meetnum=5945#