Asian Games: China`s divers seek perfect 10

Incheon: Multiple Olympic champion Wu Minxia combined with partner Shi Tingmao as China successfully opened their bid to retain all 10 Asian Games diving gold medals on Monday.

Wu, who will be 29 in November, and Shi easily won the first diving event, the women`s synchronised 3m springboard, to build on their gold medal success at last year`s world championships in Barcelona.

Chen Aisen and Zhang Yangquan added the men`s synchronised 10m platform title for China in the day`s other event with 462.90 points. South Korea took the silver at 403.50 and Malaysia picked up the bronze with 384.90 points. 

Wu and Shi reserved their best for the fifth and last round when they executed a perfectly co-ordinated back dive with two-and-a-half somersaults that earned warm applause from some 1,000 fans at the Park Tae-Hwan aquatics centre.

China finished with 318.60 points -- 30.90 ahead of second-placed Malaysia and 44.28 in front of bronze medallists North Korea.

China won all 10 diving gold medals at stake in Guangzhou four years ago and they will be favourites to repeat the feat in Incheon, South Korea.

"It is due to Wu that we were able to win the gold," said Shi, 23. "She keeps advising and encouraging me. We are just so happy to make a good start at these Games."

Wu`s gold medal in the same event at the London Games in 2012 made her the first woman to win diving titles at three consecutive Olympics.

Wu, the first woman to win diving gold in three consecutive Olympics since Athens in 2004, is expected to appear in the 1m and 3m springboard events in what could well be her final Asian Games.