By Michael Church, OCA Media
Tokyo, Japan, September 26, 2026: Chen Yuxi and Lu Wei won the first gold medal of the Asian Games Aichi-Nagoya 2026 diving programme on Saturday as the Chinese pair left their opponents battling for the minor medals in the women’s 10 metres synchronised platform.
Chen, the double Olympic champion in the event, was competing at the Asian Games with Lu for the first time and put in a performance that saw the duo awarded 347.82 points, almost 30 points more than DPR Korea pair Jo Jin Mi and Kim Mi Rae, who took silver.
Kim Nahyun and Moon Nayun from Korea won the bronze medal.
“This was the first event of the diving competition and we are very happy to have won China’s first diving gold here,” said Chen.
“Overall, it was a normal performance, and I performed to my usual training level. I felt more excited than nervous. I think that was an important reason why I was able to show what I can do in training.”
The Chinese pair never trailed during the five rounds of dives with Chen and Lu notching up an initial 54.00 points on their opener, a back dive with pike rated with a 2.0 difficulty.
From there they moved through their routine in imperious fashion, hitting a high of 81.60 points for their penultimate dive, an inward three-and-a-half somersaults with tuck which was given a 3.2 difficulty rating.
The win saw Chen retain the gold medal she won in Hangzhou alongside Quan Hongchan while Lu, a world champion in this event in 2019, won her first Asian Games gold medal.
“For me, changing partners or making adjustments during training is a very normal part of the process,” said Chen. “The main thing is adjusting my role and mindset depending on the partner I'm working with. But I think we've handled the training-related issues pretty well.”
DPR Korea duo Jo and Kim were ranked third after their opening dive but moved up into second following a reverse dive with pike which saw them finish ahead of Korea's Kim and Moon to secure silver.
“It went the way I had expected,” said Moon, who salvaged their third-place finish with a strong final dive to finish ahead of Malaysia’s Pandelela Rinong and Nur Mohammad. “We dived well when it mattered and we got a good result, so it feels wonderful.”
