Alexandri sisters win women's duet free title at swimming worlds

Austrian twin sisters Anna-Maria and Eirini-Marina Alexandri claimed the women's duet free title at the World Aquatics Championships here on Thursday, reported Xinhua.

Anna-Maria and Eirini-Marina Alexandri, the bronze medalists at last year's Budapest worlds, scored 255.4583 points to edge past Chinese twins Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi, the defending champions, by 0.2103 points.

The bronze went to Japan's Moe Higa and Mashiro Yasunaga with 249.5167 points.

"I felt really well in the water," Anna-Maria said. "I didn't feel tired. I was stressed because we were fighting for a medal and even more because we qualified in fifth place in the preliminaries."

A jubilant Eirini-Marina said that the victory was won due to "one heart".

"We feel each other and we know how each other feels in the water. Just by seeing her, I know what she is thinking. The connection is really special."

Wang Liuyi and Wang Qianyi, who qualified ninth in the preliminaries, were happy with the silver.

"I think today's performance was well executed. After the preliminaries we made some adjustments to the performance. Thanks to that we were able to give a good performance and express what the presentation meant in the finals," said Liuyi.

Qianyi added, "Today's performance in the final was generally better than in the preliminaries. I think it's great because we were able to demonstrate what we came here to do."