Roma 2022: Ukraine and Italy secure day three Duet golds

ARCHIVE

Ukraine and Italy added further gold medals to their impressive honours list at the LEN European Aquatics Championships with Duet victories at the Stadio Nicola Pietrangeli venue. The third day of Roma 2022 artistic swimming also saw the Ukraine top the standings after the Women’s Team Free preliminaries.

DUET FREE FINAL:
Ukrainian twin sisters Maryna and Vladyslava Aleksiiva continued their impressive medal-winning streak with a dazzling display in the Duet Free Final.
The pair, who claimed five medals at the World Championships in June, already had claimed gold medals on successive days at the Europeans and made it three in a row after recording a total of 94.7333. Erini-Marina and Anna-Maria Alexandri, who form two parts of the Austrian team’s impressive triplet line-up with Solo Technical bronze medallist Vasiliki, achieved 93.0000, which was an improvement on their preliminary score. The Italian duo Linda Cerruti and Costanza Ferro rounded off the podium places with a score of 91.7000 to take bronze. “We are very happy with this gold medal, it means a lot to us because I think this is our personal best score,” said Maryna Aleksiiva. Duet partner Maryna Aleksiiva continued; “I am happy with how we opened these Championships, but it’s important that we continue improving our form and score.”

MIXED DUET FINAL:
24 hours after making history by becoming the first-ever European Champion in a Men’s Solo Technical event Giorgio Minisini returned to the pool with his partner Lucrezia Ruggiero seeking further success. The Italians won the world title for the first time together just under two months ago and produced an entertaining display while performing to ‘Beggin’ by Maneskin. They achieved an overall total of 89.7333 to take gold, with Spaniards Pau Ribes Culla and Emma Garcia (84.7667) second. Jozef Solymosy and Silvia Solymosyova of Slovakia (77.0333) were third. “I would like to thank the fans for carrying us all the way,” said Giorgio Minisini. “It was truly emotional.” Lucrezia Ruggiero added; “I could see the stands, it was so moving, it almost made me forget how physically demanding this routine is, so it feels great to win here in Rome.”

WOMEN’S TEAM FREE PRELIMINARIES:
Ukraine has been the outstanding nation so far at the Roma 2022 European Championships and it would take a brave individual to bet against further success for the nation in the Team Free Final after an outstanding display in the preliminaries. The squad, who won Team Technical gold on the opening day of competition, and featured solo champion Marta Fiedina as well as duet gold medallists Vladyslava and Maryna Aleksiiva, attained an impressive total of 94.7000. The Italian team were also strong and their total of 91.7333 suggested they will again in contention for the major medals, with France (89.5000), Greece (88.0000) and Israel (85.1667) all showing podium potential. The Women’s Team Free Final will take place on Monday, the final day of artistic swimming at Roma 2022.