Divers Ready to Compete at Olympic Games on Wednesday
8/25/2004 12:00:00 AM | Swimming & Diving
Aug. 25, 2004
ATHENS, Greece - After winning a Silver Medal as partners in synchronized diving, former University of Houston diver Yulia Pakhalina and current administrative assistant Vera Ilyina will compete against one another during the individual springboard event at the 2004 Olympic Games on Wednesday. The springboard event begins with the preliminaries at 5:30 a.m. (CDT) (1:30 p.m. in Athens), Wednesday at the Olympic Aquatic Centre. The semifinals begin at 3 a.m. (CDT) (noon in Athens), Thursday with the finals slated to start at 1 p.m. (CDT) (9 p.m. in Athens). Each of the 33 participants in the preliminaries will perform five dives. The top 18 divers in the preliminaries will advance to the semifinals. From there, the top 12 divers will compete during the finals Thursday evening. Earlier at the Games, the Russian duo combined to win the Silver Medal in synchronized diving. Pakhalina and Ilyina were the defending gold medalists in that event but fell less than seven points short of the first-place Chinese team. Both divers should challenge for medals after strong performances in their last Olympic outing. During the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia, Pakhalina finished fourth in the individual springboard, while Ilyina placed sixth. The Cougars are well represented at the Olympics. In addition to the two divers, UH diving head coach Jane Figueiredo is serving as an assistant coach on the Russian Team. This is the fourth Olympics in which Ilyina has competed and the fourth for Figueiredo as well (three as coach, one as participant). Pakhalina is competing in her second Olympic Games. A five-time NCAA individual national champion on the 1-meter and 3-meter springboard, Pakhalina established herself as one of the most decorated female student-athletes in Cougar history. The Penza, Russia, native reeled off 36 consecutive wins in collegiate competition and was an 11-time Conference USA Diver of the Week honoree. The dean of the UH Swimming and Diving Coach staff, Figueiredo is a two-time NCAA Diving Coach of the Year and three-time recipient of the C-USA Coach of the Year honor and taken 16 divers to the NCAA Championships. In addition, her divers have swept all three C-USA postseason awards in each of the last three seasons. Ilyina, who begins her second season as an administrative assistant in 2004-05, was an award-winning diver at Texas from 1996-98.