KIMIKO
HIRAI SOLDATI
OFFICIAL SITE
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OFFICIAL SITE |
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Pakhalina leads 3-meter field into semifinal roundBy DAVID BARRON ATHENS, GREECE - First place wasn't good enough for Yulia Pakhalina. Pakhalina, 26, the former University of Houston diver who competes for Russia, was in first place after the five-round preliminaries Wednesday in women's 3-meter springboard diving, but she was far from satisfied with her performance. "It wasn't that great," she said. "But we did our best for this day. Now we have to start from scratch." Pakhalina had 347.04 points to lead the 18 women who qualified for today's semifinals. The top 12 finishers after the five preliminary and four semifinal dives qualify for the 9 p.m. (1 p.m. CDT) final round. Preliminary scores will be dropped after the semis, and the four semifinal dive scores will be combined with the five-round finals to determine the medalists. Pakhalina was the event's top-scoring diver on the final two rounds and was never lower than seventh in any round, even though she never got a score above 8.5 for the day. She leads Blythe Hartley of Canada by 25.71 points and Guo Jingjing of China by 27.33 entering the semifinals. Vera Ilyina, the former University of Texas diver from Russia who trains with Pakhalina under UH diving coach Jane Figueriedo, led after three dives but missed her fourth dive and was in fourth place, 35.07 points off the lead. One face that will be missing from today's semifinals is American Kimiko Soldati's. The 30-year-old from Magnolia finished the springboard premliminaries in 21st place — three spots short of the qualifying cutoff. Now Soldati will have to decide if Wednesday was the last chapter of her diving career. Hampered by an injured right shoulder that has required six cortisone injections since the Olympic Trials in June, Soldati struggled with her first two dives, rallied in the third and fourth rounds but struggled again in her fifth dive. Despite her difficulties, she was just under 13 points from the final qualifying spot. And even though her Olympics were done, she strapped an ice bag to her right shoulder as if she were getting ready for one more run at the gold. "I faced a fork in the road after my second dive on how I was going to handle things," she said. "I either was going to lie down to my doubts and my fears, because I was scared of diving like this and worried I wasn't going to be able to perform, or I was going to stand up. And I refused to lie down. I couldn't have done any more." To cope with the long wait between dives in the field of 33 competitors and to take her mind off the constant ache in her shoulder, she exchanged text messages on her cellular phone with her husband, Adam Soldati, who was in the stands. "Before the third round, I (messaged) him, 'I'm a fighter, I'm not gonna give up,' " she said. "And he messaged, 'Way to go. Believe.' " Even though 30 is a relatively advanced age for Olympic-level diving, Soldati won't rule out another run at the Olympics in four years. "I don't want to end like this," she said. "After this is over and I have a moment to sit and think about my future, the way I felt at Olympic trials shows my potential. That is what I can improve from, and if I can stay healthy and improve from that, I would love to. But I'm not going not make any decisions now."
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