From seventh place in qualifying to third in the final, Iris Tió came back in style in the Fukuoka Convention Center pool to give Spain its first medal of this World Cup, a bronze of great merit, a medal that rewards faith and the work of the Barcelonan.
Unattainable gold, which before swimming and as if it were a Russian, everyone knew that it would go to the Japanese Yukiko Inui (276, 5717), the fight for the medals became very uphill when in the preliminary , Tió was seventh after suffering two penalties (‘base mark’) that weighed down her score.
In the final, the Austrian Vasiliki Alexandri also surpassed her (264.42 for 254.21) and in the absence of a swimmer, the Greek Evangelia Platanioti, who had been second in the preliminary, everything was up in the air.
Helena scored 242.5 points. Beth Fernández, the Spaniard who trains her, tried to comfort her, but Evangelia could not hang the medal, because she was penalized with a penalty (‘base mark’), which is the new VAR for the artist. The new regulation contemplates this possibility and the scores are no longer predictable. It happened to Tió in the preliminary and it happened to Platanioti in the final, at the worst moment.
Iris knew that she had to exploit her physique. Those 173 centimeters, her technique and her accumulated work. Her exercise is based on Mahler’s symphony number 1, ‘Titan’, and the Catalan gave it her all, she was precise, she risked just enough and she did not suffer any penalty.
From musician parents, the shy Iris, as her coach, the Japanese Mayuku Fujiki, always tells, is a mix of Gemma Mengual and Ona Carbonell. This Saturday, the results have proved Mayu right, since Iris joins Mengual, Carbonell and also Andrea Fuentes as the fourth Spaniard to win a medal in a solo exercise in a major competition.
With wide movements, Iris Tió completed the seven elements of the exercise with precision, the five mandatory and the two hybrids. She left the pool satisfied, then her score proved her right.
He got 254.21 points, almost 50 points more than in the preliminary (204.6666); without penalties, his execution shot up to 151.81 points compared to 102.4 in the preliminary, while his artistic impression (102.4) was once again one of the highest in the contest.
This is the story of the first medal of the Spanish delegation in this World Cup, a bronze in solo technical, but everything indicates that the harvest could be even better, after Fernando Díaz del Río has signed the best score in the previous one of the only technical, and the mixed technical duo (Emma García and Dennis González) have also signed the best exercise.
Without the Russians, with a new regulation and also with the better quality of the two boys, the Spanish team is willing to return to the top.
