With two 10s from the judges and the highest-scoring three-second dive of the whole competition, Englishman Gary Hunt makes it three wins out of three with a new personal-best score of 533.90 points in Texas. The season\u2019s third stop operated under a revised schedule due to the probability of severe weather conditions in the region and produced a World Series champions\u2019 podium, as Orlando Duque, from Colombia, and Artem Silchenko, from Russia \u2013 the winners in 2009 and 2013 \u2013 complete the top-three from the 27m platform. The women\u2019s competition, which kicked off the 2015 season here at Possum Kingdom Lake, sees Rachelle Simpson, the reigning champion from San Antonio, Texas, take first place from twice the Olympic height.<\/p>\n
The hat-trick in wins went to the apparently unstoppable 30-year-old Gary Hunt, while Colombian legend Orlando Duque (478.70pts.) made it his third podium in three competitions and settled old scores with this location as he had finished bottom of the standings after a failed dive the previous year. Completing the podium was the third winner of a World Series, Russia\u2019s Artem Silchenko (466.90pts.), who earlier beat American Andy Jones in his head-to-head by another very narrow margin, and leapt up from seventh place going into the final round of dives to secure a top-three finish thanks to a brilliant execution of his back armstand dive with a blind entry.<\/p>\n
Texan Rachelle Simpson (243.40pts) dominated the first stop of the Women’s World Series, meanwhile, as 10 female athletes competed from a 20m platform. Simpson finished ahead of impressive Canadian wildcard Lysanne Richard (222.00pts) and fellow American Ginger Leigh Huber (213.40pts). The women meet again in mid July for the second stop in the Portuguese Azores.<\/p>\n
After the season opener in Cartagena, Colombia, at the end of April and the first 2015 stop on European soil in France\u2019s La Rochelle two weeks ago, the stop at Hell\u2019s Gate on Possum Kingdom Lake highlighted the class of this group of athletes considering the short notice of the rescheduling of the competition. High scoring dives, increasing difficulty in the women\u2019s competition and a strong overall performance of Team USA with a win and a third place in the women\u2019s comp and three athletes in the top eight in the men\u2019s category \u2013 from the US\u2019 Lone Star State the cliff diving elite takes the leap over the Atlantic and returns to Denmark\u2019s capital city, Copenhagen, for more diving complexity at 85kph in three weeks\u2019 time.<\/p>\n
QUOTES FROM THE WINNERS<\/strong><\/p>\n Gary Hunt (UK)<\/strong><\/p>\n The schedule wasn\u2019t certain, but I thrive on that! One of the things I love about cliff diving is it\u2019s not so rigid. You have to be flexible and willing to dive when you\u2019re not 100 percent prepared. I\u2019m really happy to have come through and put in a good performance here. Today the conditions were perfect and it sounds strange saying that because we\u2019ve been talking so much about the weather. I like it here and I\u2019ve got my highest scores in this event. I don\u2019t know why it is, but the temperature\u2019s right, the water\u2019s good and it seems to come at a good time when I\u2019m firing on all cylinders. There was actually a tiny bit of disappointment not going past 540 because I have a bet with Artem. He broke 530 first and so we raised the bar to 540 and I thought I might have been able to do it here! Three wins out of three is the start that I hoped for, I\u2019ve had four wins in a row in my career before [in 2010] and I\u2019m going to try and beat that again. It started off a bit crazy with the weather \u2013 we weren\u2019t even sure that we could compete, so I wasn\u2019t in my normal routine, but I wanted to come in strong and have a good start to the season and that\u2019s what I\u2019ve done, so I\u2019m really, really happy. The girls are increasing their Degree of Difficulty and we have new girls competing. It\u2019s so exciting seeing more of us wanting to get into the sport. I think this year is going to be a big race, as the girls are getting braver and wanting to do more tricks. It\u2019s going to be an exciting year for us with two more competitions to come.<\/p>\n Results Stop 3, POSSUM KINGDOM LAKE<\/strong><\/p>\n Men<\/strong><\/p>\n 1. Gary Hunt | UK | 533.90pts.<\/p>\n 2. Orlando Duque | COL | 478.70<\/p>\n 3. Artem Silchenko | RUS | 466.90<\/p>\n 4. David Colturi | USA | 465.60<\/p>\n 5. Blake Aldridge | UK | 428.00<\/p>\n 6. Steven LoBue | USA | 421.30<\/p>\n 7. Jonathan Paredes | MEX | 409.15<\/p>\n 8. Andy Jones | USA | 300.70<\/p>\n 9. Miguel Garcia (wildcard) | COL | 277.65<\/p>\n 10. Sergio Guzman (wildcard) | MEX | 261.55<\/p>\n 11. Kyle Mitrione (wildcard) | USA | 244.20<\/p>\n
\nRachelle Simpson (USA)<\/strong><\/p>\n