Oleksii Sereda and Mark Hrytsenko Win ‘Bronze’ at the Diving World Cup Super Final With a Season Best

The athletes posted their best result yet as a duo.

Ukraine won bronze in the 10m synchronized event at the Diving World Cup Super Final, held May 2 in Beijing, China. Oleksii Sereda and Mark Hrytsenko earned their first medal together, with a personal best result.

Based on the results of the two stages in Guadalajara and Windsor, the national team qualified for five events at the series' concluding competition. So beyond the team event, the Ukrainians are represented in China in the men's 3m and 10m synchronized events, the women's individual 10m platform event, and the men's individual event at the same height.

The boys were first to compete in the super final, on the 3m platform — Stanislav Oliferchyk and Kirill Boliukh finished seventh. The women's synchronized divers placed higher — Kseniia Bailo and Sofiia Lyskun. The athletes were in third place after five dives, but dropped to fifth after the final one.

The duo of Oleksii Sereda and Mark Hrytsenko were the third pair to climb the Beijing towers. In both previous stages, in Guadalajara and Windsor, the pair finished in fifth place.

How Oleksii Sereda and Mark Hrytsenko Performed at the Diving World Cup Super Final

• The final in Beijing consisted of just six teams — besides Ukraine, pairs from China, Mexico, Australia, Germany, and a 'neutral' team competed for medals.

• After the first dive, scored 49.20 points, the Ukrainians shared third place with two other teams — Australia and Germany.
• The second dive of the same degree of difficulty brought the duo 48.60 points. Even so, the gap to the second-place pair remained minimal — Oleksii and Mark trailed Australia by less than two points.
• On the third dive, Oleksii Sereda made a mistake on his water entry. Judges scored the execution and synchronization at 62.40 points, dropping the Ukrainians to sixth. The fourth dive, meanwhile, didn't go well for Mark Hrytsenko on the opening, though it still brought Ukraine 72 points.
• Oleksii Sereda and Mark Hrytsenko performed the program's most difficult dive, with a 3.7 degree of difficulty, better than at any other point this season — scoring 83.25 points. That let Ukraine leapfrog three teams at once, moving into provisional third place.
• The Ukrainians' lead over fourth place stood at nine points heading into the final dive. Sereda and Hrytsenko performed it, with a 3.6 degree of difficulty, for 79.92 points, securing bronze for themselves.

As a result, Team Ukraine won its first medal at the Diving World Cup Super Final, and its second of the season, following Oleksii Sereda's bronze in Windsor. Their combined score of 395.37 points was the pair's best result of the season, and the medal was their first together.

Diving World Cup Super Final 10m Synchronized Diving. Men

1. China — 460.92 points

2. 'Neutral' Athletes — 426.69

3. Ukraine — 395.37

4. Germany — 383.07

5. Mexico — 380.58

6. Australia — 364.41

Ukraine's next event will be the team competition featuring all of the national team's athletes. Competition takes place May 2 at 13:32 Kyiv time.