Paris Olympics: Melissa Wu and Ellie Cole reach 10m platform diving final

Half a lifetime since becoming an Olympic teenage sensation, Melissa Wu has plunged into the record books again by diving for Australia in a record five Games — and reaching a fifth 10-metre platform final.

Yet while the 32-year-old celebrated her landmark performance in Paris, she was just as excited about the performance of Ellie Cole, a Sydney teenager who has always idolised her.

The elegant 17-year-old actually eclipsed her hero, finishing as the sixth-best qualifier from the semifinals with her five dives scoring 309.90 points, while Wu edged in as the 11th of the dozen finalists on 294.10.

Wu, with a big heart that has kept her forging on through injury setbacks and off the back of a dialled-back training load, defied the odds at the Olympic Aquatics Centre on Monday to reach her landmark final.

She has finished sixth, fourth, fifth and third on the platform in her previous Games, and it would be astonishing after her struggles since winning bronze in Tokyo three years ago if she was able to again land a place in the top half-dozen.

It was 16 years ago at the Beijing Games that Wu, at 16 years and 101 days, became the youngest Australian diver to win an Olympic medal in the synchro and just three years ago, in her fourth Games, she took her first individual medal.

But it has become a harder slog for the 1.52m-tall Wu ever since suffering a back injury during filming for reality TV show SAS Australia soon after the Tokyo Games.

It kicked off a chain reaction of other problems, including bulging discs in her neck and knee trouble, which hampered her at this year’s world championships.

#	Flags	Country	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1		USA	21	30	28	79
2		China	21	18	14	53
3		France	13	16	19	48
4		Australia	13	12	8	33
5		Great Britain	12	13	17	42
6		South Korea	11	8	7	26
7		Japan	10	5	11	26
8		Italy	9	10	6	25
9		Germany	8	5	4	17
10		Netherlands	7	5	6	18
11		Canada	5	4	8	17
12		New Zealand	3	5	1	9
13		Hungary	3	3	2	8
		Sweden	3	3	2	8
15		Romania	3	3	1	7
16		Ireland	3	0	3	6
17		Brazil	2	5	6	13
18		Ukraine	2	2	3	7
19		Croatia	2	1	2	5
20		Belgium	2	0	3	5
21		Hong Kong	2	0	2	4
22		Azerbaijan	2	0	0	2
		Philippines	2	0	0	2
		Serbia	2	0	0	2
25		Israel	1	4	1	6
26		Spain	1	3	5	9
27		Switzerland	1	2	4	7
28		Georgia	1	2	1	4
29		Kazakhstan	1	1	2	4
		South Africa	1	1	2	4
31		Kenya	1	1	1	3
32		Denmark	1	1	0	2
33		Taiwan	1	0	3	4
34		Uzbekistan	1	0	2	3
35		Czech Republic	1	0	1	2
36		Guatemala	1	0	1	2
37		Algeria	1	0	0	1
38		Argentina	1	0	0	1
39		Chile	1	0	0	1
40		Dominica	1	0	0	1
41		Ecuador	1	0	0	1
42		Norway	1	0	0	1
43		Saint Lucia	1	0	0	1
44		Slovenia	1	0	0	1
45		Uganda	1	0	0	1
46		Jamaica	0	2	1	3
47		Mexico	0	2	1	3
48		North Korea	0	2	1	3
49		Ethiopia	0	2	0	2
50		Greece	0	1	5	6
51		Poland	0	1	3	4
52		Kosovo	0	1	1	2
53		Turkey	0	1	1	2
54		Armenia	0	1	0	1
55		Colombia	0	1	0	1
56		Fiji	0	1	0	1
57		Mongolia	0	1	0	1
58		Thailand	0	1	0	1
59		Tunisia	0	1	0	1
60		India	0	0	3	3
61		Tajikistan	0	0	3	3
62		Dominican Republic	0	0	2	2
63		Lithuania	0	0	2	2
64		Malaysia	0	0	2	2
65		Moldova	0	0	2	2
66		Austria	0	0	1	1
67		Cape Verde Islands	0	0	1	1
68		Cuba	0	0	1	1
69		Egypt	0	0	1	1
70		Grenada	0	0	1	1
71		Indonesia	0	0	1	1
72		Portugal	0	0	1	1
73		Slovakia	0	0	1	1
74		Afghanistan	0	0	0	0
75		Albania	0	0	0	0
76		American Samoa	0	0	0	0
77		Andorra	0	0	0	0
78		Angola	0	0	0	0
79		Antigua & Barbuda	0	0	0	0
80		Aruba	0	0	0	0
81		Bahamas	0	0	0	0
82		Bahrain	0	0	0	0
83		Bangladesh	0	0	0	0
84		Barbados	0	0	0	0
85		Belize	0	0	0	0
86		Benin	0	0	0	0
87		Bermuda	0	0	0	0
88		Bhutan	0	0	0	0
89		Bolivia	0	0	0	0
90		Bosnia-Herzegovina	0	0	0	0
91		Botswana	0	0	0	0
92		British Virgin Islands	0	0	0	0
93		Brunei	0	0	0	0
94		Bulgaria	0	0	0	0
95		Burkina Faso	0	0	0	0
96		Burundi	0	0	0	0
97		Cambodia	0	0	0	0
98		Cameroon	0	0	0	0
99		Cayman Islands	0	0	0	0
100		Central African Republic	0	0	0	0
101		Chad	0	0	0	0
102		Comoros	0	0	0	0
103		Congo	0	0	0	0
104		Cook Islands	0	0	0	0
105		Costa Rica	0	0	0	0
106		Cyprus	0	0	0	0
107		Djibouti	0	0	0	0
108		DR Congo	0	0	0	0
109		El Salvador	0	0	0	0
110		Equatorial Guinea	0	0	0	0
111		Eritrea	0	0	0	0
112		Estonia	0	0	0	0
113		Eswatini	0	0	0	0
114		Federated States of Micronesia	0	0	0	0
115		Finland	0	0	0	0
116		Gabon	0	0	0	0
117		Gambia	0	0	0	0
118		Ghana	0	0	0	0
119		Guam	0	0	0	0
120		Guinea	0	0	0	0
121		Guinea-Bissau	0	0	0	0
122		Guyana	0	0	0	0
123		Haiti	0	0	0	0
124		Honduras	0	0	0	0
125		Iceland	0	0	0	0
126		Iran	0	0	0	0
127		Iraq	0	0	0	0
127		Ivory Coast	0	0	0	0
128		Jordan	0	0	0	0
129		Kiribati	0	0	0	0
130		Kuwait	0	0	0	0
131		Kyrgyzstan	0	0	0	0
132		Laos	0	0	0	0
133		Latvia	0	0	0	0
134		Lebanon	0	0	0	0
135		Lesotho	0	0	0	0
136		Liberia	0	0	0	0
137		Libya	0	0	0	0
138		Liechtenstein	0	0	0	0
139		Luxembourg	0	0	0	0
140		Madagascar	0	0	0	0
141		Malawi	0	0	0	0
142		Maldives	0	0	0	0
143		Mali	0	0	0	0
144		Malta	0	0	0	0
145		Marshall Islands	0	0	0	0
146		Mauritania	0	0	0	0
147		Mauritius	0	0	0	0
148		Monaco	0	0	0	0
149		Montenegro	0	0	0	0
150		Morocco	0	0	0	0
151		Mozambique	0	0	0	0
152		Myanmar	0	0	0	0
153		Namibia	0	0	0	0
154		Nauru	0	0	0	0
155		Nepal	0	0	0	0
156		Nicaragua	0	0	0	0
157		Niger	0	0	0	0
158		Nigeria	0	0	0	0
159		North Macedonia	0	0	0	0
160		Oman	0	0	0	0
161		Pakistan	0	0	0	0
162		Palau	0	0	0	0
163		Palestine	0	0	0	0
164		Panama	0	0	0	0
165		Papua New Guinea	0	0	0	0
166		Paraguay	0	0	0	0
167		Peru	0	0	0	0
168		Puerto Rico	0	0	0	0
169		Qatar	0	0	0	0
170		Refugee Olympic Athletes	0	0	0	0
171		Rwanda	0	0	0	0
172		Saint Kitts and Nevis	0	0	0	0
173		Saint Vincent and the Grenadines	0	0	0	0
174		Samoa	0	0	0	0
175		San Marino	0	0	0	0
176		São Tomé and Príncipe	0	0	0	0
177		Saudi Arabia	0	0	0	0
178		Senegal	0	0	0	0
179		Seychelles	0	0	0	0
180		Sierra Leone	0	0	0	0
181		Singapore	0	0	0	0
182		Solomon Islands	0	0	0	0
183		Somalia	0	0	0	0
184		South Sudan	0	0	0	0
185		Sri Lanka	0	0	0	0
186		Sudan	0	0	0	0
187		Suriname	0	0	0	0
188		Syria	0	0	0	0
189		Tanzania	0	0	0	0
190		Timor-Leste	0	0	0	0
191		Togo	0	0	0	0
192		Tonga	0	0	0	0
193		Trinidad & Tobago	0	0	0	0
194		Turkmenistan	0	0	0	0
195		Tuvalu	0	0	0	0
196		UA Emirates	0	0	0	0
197		Uruguay	0	0	0	0
198		Vanuatu	0	0	0	0
199		Venezuela	0	0	0	0
200		Vietnam	0	0	0	0
201		Virgin Islands	0	0	0	0
202		Yemen	0	0	0	0
203		Zambia	0	0	0	0
204		Zimbabwe	0	0	0	0