Chantelle Newbery of Australia won the gold medal in the Women's 10m Platform competition on Sunday night at the Olympic Aquatic Center.

Newbery took the lead after the third round and held onto that position for the remainder of the competition. The win marked the first gold medal for Australia in the Athens 2004 Diving competitions.

The 27-year-old took the gold with 590.31 points ahead of Lao Lishi from China (576.26 points) and Loudy Tourky of Australia with 561.66 points.

Lao, who ranked fourth after the fourth round, edged out both 10m Platform World Champion Emilie Heymans from Canada and Tourky, who were in second and third position going into the final round, with a strong dive in the fifth.

Tourky secured the bronze only 5.31 points ahead of Emilie Heymans as fourth. Laura Wilkinson from the United States, the defending Olympic Champion from 2000, finished fifth.

Li Ting, 2003 Synchronized 10m Platform World Champion, took sixth place in the final rankings.

The Diving events will continue tomorrow, 23 August at 13.30 with the Men's 3m Springboard preliminaries.

(Xinhua News Agency August 23, 2004)