Cao Yuan won the men's 10-metre platform event on Saturday at the Paris Olympics to complete a golden sweep for China, the first time a country has won all the diving events at one Games.
Rikuto Tamai of Japan took silver to land Japan's first ever Olympic diving medal, and Britain's Noah Williams finished in third place to claim the bronze.
Four-time Olympian Cao, 29, successfully defended his title against 17-year-old Tamai, who delivered some of Saturday's best dives in an exhilarating final that had the crowd roaring over and again.
Cao's win meant China took all eight diving golds up for grabs in Paris.
🇨🇳 People's Republic of China diving into history! A golden sweep like never before at the Olympic Games. 🥇#Paris2024 #Diving pic.twitter.com/hsDlEzahBp
— World Aquatics (@WorldAquatics) August 10, 2024
"I haven't thought about getting the eighth gold. I was more focused on my own competition," Cao told reporters after the event.
"I won the event last time so I have some experience, even though I performed better last time than today," he said. "I ran into some difficulties (since Tokyo) and persevered. When it came to the Olympics this time, I just believed I could absolutely do a good job. I was very confident."
Tamai had wowed fans with a superbly executed first dive, only to be overtaken by Cao, who scored 96.90 points with an average score of 9.5 from the judges to establish a strong lead.
The Japanese teenager came back with a stronger performance in the second round to overtake Cao and continued with a top-notch third dive.
Tamai however had a problematic fifth dive which ended with a massive splash. That mistake eventually cost him the gold, allowing Cao to widen his lead as the Chinese veteran dived with composure to finish off on 547.50 points.
"Japan's first medal is something I achieved today. I was concsious of that goal. I was nervous as well. I felt slightly wary of this challenge, a lot of tension, a lot of pressure that led to the failure of 307C (his fifth dive)," Tamai said.
"The next goal is to reach for the gold medal because I believe I'm in that position to reach for the gold," he said.
Britain's Williams, who won a silver medal in the synchronised event with Tom Daley two weeks ago, rebounded well in his last two dives after slipping to ninth in the third round, to claim the third place on the podium.
"To be on the podium, even though I messed up one of my dives, I can't really ask for more," Williams said. "That's competition. Sometimes you mess up, but you can only compete with what everyone else does as well. And today third, so I'm so happy."
With his Paris title, Cao has now won gold medals at four consecutive Olympics. China's Wu Minxia is the only other diver to achieve that feat.
As well as winning the event in Tokyo, he also won the synchronised 10-metre platform in the London Games in 2012 and individual 3-metre springboard in Rio four years later.
"I feel very proud," Cao said. "Every time I competed in the Olympics, I've won. I've actually worked really hard for it. To me, to be able to win it every time is such a great honour," Cao said.
The 36th gold🥇 for #TeamChina!
— Chinese Olympic Committee (@OlympicsCN) August 10, 2024
Congrats to Cao Yuan for defending his title in the Diving Men's 10m Platform! #Paris2024 #Olympics pic.twitter.com/yAOPDYdmav
His medal tally also includes a silver in the synchronised 10-metre event in Tokyo and a bronze in the synchronised 3-metre event in Rio.
China's world champion Yang Hao, who came second in the semifinal, was completely off his game in the final with one messy dive after another to end up the last place.