Three dives into the Olympic 3m springboard final, South Africa’s Julia Vincent was in medal contention. But two disappointing dives to complete the set of five meant she dropped down to finish in 11th spot overall in Paris on Friday, 9 August, 2024.
The 29-year-old could nevertheless be justifiably proud of her achievements, having become the first South African in history to reach an Olympic diving final. Vincent said afterwards, she was nail-bitingly close to perfecting the ill-fated fourth dive.
“I actually thought I had it, I thought I had it till the end. I just came around and made a small error which takes you a little over, but I really had it until the last millisecond of the dive.”
South Africa’s First-Ever Olympic Diving Finalist, Julia Vincent
As for competing in her first Olympic final before retiring, Vincent added: “I definitely feel proud. I did want it to go better, but I feel proud. I hope that someone, one little girl can feel like you know what, maybe I can do something like this one day, it doesn’t matter where I’m from. I hope that that’s inspired at least one little person that has big dreams.”
Vincent moved to the USA to study and train in 2014 and said after her competition that it would be unlikely for a South African diver to reach an Olympic final while still based in the country.
“I think there’s a lot to be done before we can have a homegrown diver, an Olympic diver, just because we need more facilities, we need more support financially, there’s a lot that we need. So I think we do really, really well with what we have,” she reckoned.
Vincent added that despite her plans to remain in the USA, where she is due to get married next year, she hopes to remain involved in South African diving.
“I feel like I would love to see how we could structure it differently, just to aid the athlete a little bit more,” she said.
“I think sometimes the athlete goes through a lot and there’s a lot of the times it’s things that athletes shouldn’t be going through. I wear very many hats, and I’ve worn very many hats my whole career, and sometimes I would have just wanted to be the athlete. So I would love to see what I can do to help that so that future generations don’t go through that.”
Meanwhile, Ashleigh Buhai endured her toughest day of the women’s Olympic golf tournament so far on Friday, shooting a third-round 74 to finish the day in a tie for 17th, eight shots off the joint leaders, Morgane Metraux of Switzerland and Lydia Ko of New Zealand.
“Today was a little tougher. The wind definitely picked up more than the other days, a little stronger. A lot of back pins, I felt a lot of in-between yardages today so I battled to hit it close, because it was a case of just maybe playing a little defensive and not making sure I went long, so I didn’t quite hit it close enough to make birdies.”
South Africa’s Leading Golfer in Paris, Ashleigh Buhai
“I still felt I executed the shots that I needed to well. I just didn’t manage to hit it close enough to offset the bogies that I made,” explained Buhai whose round included two birdies and four bogeys.
As for her plans for the final round tomorrow, the 2022 British Open champion added: “Again just keep doing what I’m doing. I feel my game is in a good place.”
“I didn’t play that badly today, I probably made three bad swings and the rest was just very steady. I have to just try and maybe play a little more aggressive tomorrow when I can, but trust the process and what I’m doing and don’t really think about the outcome and hopefully it’ll all take care of itself.”
SA’s other golfer in Paris, Paula Reto, shot a third-round 76 and is tied for 49th place.
Over at the Stade de France, there was disappointment for Marioné Fourie who finished sixth in her 100m hurdles semifinal in a time of 13.01 seconds. Had she managed to repeat the new national record of 12.49 seconds she set in the Netherlands just a month ago, Fourie would have made it into the final just ahead of the second-fastest non-automatic qualifier, Cyrena Samba-Mayelo of France.
Team South Africa’s Women’s Contingent and Paris 2024 Broadcast Updates
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Saturday, 27 July, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Sunday, 28 July, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Monday, 29 July, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Tuesday, 30 July, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Wednesday, 31 July, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Thursday, 1 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Friday, 2 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Saturday, 3 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Sunday, 4 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Monday, 5 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Tuesday, 6 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Wednesday, 7 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Thursday, 8 August, 2024
Paris 2024 Olympic Games Results on Friday, 9 August, 2024
Golf
Women’s Individual Stroke play round three –
Ashleigh Buhai is tied 17th, 1 under par after R3, 8 shots off the joint lead of Morgane Metraux (SUI) and Lydia Ko (NZL)
Paula Reto is T49 in a group of 3 after a round of 76, tied for 229 after 54 holes
Athletics
100m Hurdles semi-finals – Marioné Fourie finished 6th in her 100m hurdles semi-final in 13.01, and did not progress to the final
Diving
3m Springboard finals – Julia Vincent finished 11th in the final of the women’s 3m springboard, completing her best of three Olympic campaigns
Schedule of Events at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games on Saturday, 10 August, 2024
Golf
09:00: Women’s individual stroke play round four – Ashleigh Buhai, Paula Reto
Athletics
19:30: Javelin Final – Jo-Ané van Dyk
Original Copy: Karien Jonckheere, with editing by gsport
Main Photo Caption: Julia Vincent pictured competing in the Games’ preliminary rounds. Vincent is proud to have become the first South African to contest an Olympic Diving final, at the 2024 Games in Paris. Photo: Anton Geyser / Team SA
Photo 2 Caption: Ashleigh Buhai during Round 2 of the Olympic golf tournament at Le Golf National in Paris earlier this week. Photo: Roger Sedres / TeamSA
Photo 3 Caption: Marioné Fourie during her 100m hurdles semi-final at the Olympic Games’ Stade de France in Paris on Friday. Photo: Roger Sedres / TeamSA
(0 rating, 0 votes, rated)
Loading...
