This Malaysian Olympian Made An Embarrassing Dive But It's Still One Of The 'Best'
Don't give up and try again, Ahmad Amsyar Azman!
By Tang Ruxyn — 17 Aug 2016, 04:54 PM
He was on course to advance to the next round of the Rio Olympics 3m springboard event on Monday, 15 August
Amsyar took the 12th place after five dives, a comfortable spot as he looked set to be one of the 18 qualifiers.
But everything went wrong during his sixth and final dive in the preliminary round. It started with a misstep on the board...
During the jumping process, the 2015 SEA Games silver medallist made a critical mistake during the jumping process as he landed far to the side of the board as he began his launch.
"It was a tactical mistake on the board and I was off-balance before taking the plunge," Amsyar reportedly said after the competition.
The 23-year-old landed face first and all of his Olympics dreams came to an end with that dive.
His comical landing on the water became a source of amusement to the spectators and coaches who were present at the Maria Lenk Aquactics Centre
Despite what people called as the "tremendous belly flop of the ages", Amsyar was awarded with 9.75 points
However, the disastrous dive did not help Amsyar and he crashed out of the preliminary round in the 3m springboard event.
It's certainly an outing that he hopes will be forgotten in due time
"I knew then that it was over as there was no way for me to make the semi-final," said a dejected Amsyar.
If it's any consolation, defending Olympic diving champion Ilia Zakharov also made headlines after scoring zero for an absolute disaster of a dive during the semi-finals on Tuesday, 16 August
Is this the worst dive you have ever seen? #rio2016 #diving https://t.co/jA1NZgJEDs
— Enda Conway (@EndaConway) August 16, 2016
Russian diver Ilya Zakharov, who won gold in the men's three-metre springboard event at London 2012, may have produced one of the worst dives in Olympic history just four years later.
The 25-year-old St Petersburg-born competitor was eliminated at the semi-final stage of the Rio Games’ three-metre competition after a spectacularly poor belly flop.
Zakharov received a round score of 0.0 from all seven judges, which ended his hopes of defending the 2012 title.
Just a few days earlier, Russian diver Nadezhda Bazhina became a social media sensation for landing flat on her feet on one dive for a shocking score of 0.0
Bazhina is a six-time European Championship gold-medalist and she was part of the Russian squad that won gold at the 2016 European Aquatics Championships.
So it's alright, Amsyar! Congratulations for making it this far. Keep the fire going and you'll succeed the next time! :)
