A Mexican diver did not fall off the springboard at Tokyo Olympics
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on August 3, 2021 at 10:59
- 3 min read
- By AFP Hong Kong
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"A Mexican teammate made a mistake in diving. Social media users: are you joking? Sorry, can't help laughing #TokyoOlympics #Diving," reads a post on Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, on July 27.
The post has attracted more than 240,000 interactions.
The video shows a male and female diver competing in a synchronised diving competition. They bounce on the springboard in preparation to jump, before the man appears to lose his balance and crashes into the water.
Simplified Chinese language text superimposed on the footage reads, "A Mexican teammate made a huge mistake in diving, the coach immediately left" and "This is the first time Guo Jingjing is judging, how can she grade their performance?!".
Guo Jingjing, a retired four-time Olympic gold medallist, appeared as a judge at the Tokyo Games, the South China Morning Post reported.
Similar posts were shared on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Chinese platforms Weibo and Bilibili.
However, the posts are misleading.
A frame-by-frame analysis of the video in the misleading posts found a sign in the background reading "Budapest 2017 FINA", which AFP has circled below in red.
A keyword search found a similar photo published here by Chinese state-owned news agency Xinhua on July 23, 2017.
The image is captioned: "Julian Sanchez of Mexico falls from his board accidentally during the Mixed 3m Springboard Synchro final of Diving at the 17th FINA World Championships at Duna Arena in Budapest, Hungary on July 22, 2017. Arantxa Chavez Munoz and Julian Sanchez of Mexico placed 13th with 223.80 points."
Julian Sanchez is a Mexican diver who ranked 7th in synchronised springboard in the 2012 London Games.
AFP also published a photo from the event. The image caption also says the image was taken at the FINA World Championships in Budapest in 2017 and in the Mixed 3m Springboard Synchronised final diving event.
The result of the 17th FINA World Championships was published here on FINA's website. It states the event was held on July 22, 2017, with Sanchez and Chavez Munoz coming 13th.
Sanchez posted on Instagram shortly after the blunder, saying he was "back in Mexico, not with the expected result" and promised to "come back stronger than ever".
He is not set to participate in the Tokyo Olympics, according to a list of athlete's names on the Games's website.
The Tokyo 2020 Olympics has 3m springboard events for men and women, but no mixed synchronised diving competition, according to the schedule.
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