Barcelona fear helped Hunt win high-diving gold

Kazan: Gary Hunt admitted a fear of repeating his Barcelona 2013 failure helped him win Britain`s third gold medal of the world aquatic championships in the men`s high-diving competition on Wednesday.

Hunt finally won the world title after finishing second in Barcelona two years ago when he lost out to Colombia`s Orlando Duque by less than a point with a poor final dive.

The 31-year-old, who has won the last five world series events and eight of the last 10, led over all five rounds of the competition in Kazan from 27 metres.

He won gold with 629.30 points as Jonathan Paredes of Mexico took silver with 596.45pts and Russia`s Artem Silchenko earned bronze with 593.95.

"I had to live with Barcelona for two years. I was nervous to do the same thing here. To have a gold medal round my neck is a big relief," said Hunt.

"Over the winter I put my blinkers on and got down to hard training. Now it`s job done."

But he said his Barcelona disappointment weighed heavily on his mind before his final dive in Kazan.

"I was in the same position I was in Barcelona and with a bad dive I would have missed the gold," he said.

"It was definitely possible, but luckily for me it didn`t happen."

Hunt says he has built a career out of being a daredevil as a child.

"I was always the diver who played around doing dives that no one else was doing when I was younger," he said with a grin.

This was Britain`s third gold medal in Kazan after Adam Peaty won the men`s 100m breaststroke final on Monday and James Guy`s victory in the men`s 200m freestyle final on Tuesday.