July 20th, 2011

Meaghan Benfeito

SHANGHAI – Meaghan Benfeito of Montreal and Roseline Filion of Laval, Que., advanced to the final on women's 10-metre tower on Wednesday in diving action at the FINA World Aquatic Championships.

With their performance they also locked up two Olympic spots in the event for Canada. China was the only other country to also qualify two spots for the London Games.

Hu Yadan of China leads after the semi finals with 403.65 points, her compatriot Ruolin Chen is second at 385.95 and Paola Espinosa of Mexico third at 366.65.

Benfeito, fourth in the preliminaries, stands seventh at 327.70 and Filion follows in eighth at 326.15.

''The preliminaries went very well except for a few small errors,'' said Benfeito, fourth at the FINA World Cup last year. ''The semifinals weren't as strong but I'm looking forward to the final.''

Filion also dropped a couple of notches in the semis after placing sixth in the prelims.

''We are very pleased to get those Olympic spots after coming up short in the 10-metre synchro,'' said Filion, the gold medallist on tower at the Canada Cup Grand Prix in May, ''To get a medal in the 10-metre individual we'll have to be almost perfect every time. We've had a great year and we know what we are capable of.''

Competition continues Thursday with the women's 10-metre tower final and the prelims and semis on men's three-metre.

Visit www.aquaticfederation.ca for full event & broadcast schedule.

Media Guides: available at www.aquaticfederation.ca

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