Filion takes silver, Benfeito and Gagne win bronze in big day for Canadian divers

TORONTO – Canadian divers had a successful start to the Pan American Games with three medals on the opening day of competition.

Roseline Filion of Laval, Que., won silver in the women’s 10-metre platform on Saturday, while Montreal’s Meaghan Benfeito took bronze.

Earlier, Montreal’s Philippe Gagne won bronze medal in the men’s three-metre springboard.

Filion scored 377.60 points, finishing just 5.6 points behind gold medallist Paola Espinosa of Mexico. Benfeito took bronze with 357.45 points.

Filion scored 79.20 points with her fourth dive — the best result of the round — to move into second place. She finished with a score of 80.00 on her fifth dive to hold off Benfeito.

It was a different story for Benfeito, who opened with a score of 81.60 and led through the first three round before fading. Still, her strong start was enough to earn a medal.

In men’s competition, Gagne totalled 421.20 points over his six dives.

“I’m extremely happy with the result,” said Gagne. “It was one of my goals here — even if I wasn’t sure I could get it (a medal) — so to see that this dream is finally real, it’s really amazing.”

His last dive earned him 89.25 points and moved him from sixth into third.

“This result will help me build my confidence,” said Gagne, who finished eighth in Friday’s preliminaries. “Yesterday, after the preliminaries my level of confidence was getting low, so this result will really help me.”

Mexico’s Rommel Pacheco won gold with a total score of 483.35, while teammate Jahir Ocampo was second with 442.15.

Francois Imbeau-Dulac of St-Lazare, Que., was sixth with 398.40 points.