The last day of the European Aquatics Diving Championships Antalya 2025 brought first medals for Spain and Poland – both golden, thanks respectively to Valeria Antolino and Ana Carvajal in the women’s 10m platform synchro and Andrzej Rzeszutek in the men’s 3m springboard.

Ukraine finished top of the medals table thanks to their five golds, but the Championships Trophy went to second-placed Germany, who won three golds, for their total of 12 medals. Italy finished third with eight medals, of which two were gold.

Rzeszutek, 33, the men’s 1m springboard champion at last year’s edition of these Championships, showed courage and consistency to win a final event that saw some huge flourishes from Germany’s Moritz Wesemann, who was seeking a third gold to go with the ones he had won in the 1m springboard and 3m synchro.

Meanwhile Britain’s Noah Penman, one of four 18-year-olds in the final, added a silver to Great Britain’s collection of three bronzes with a hugely composed performance, replicating his second place in the morning’s preliminary competition as he finished just 1.55 points behind the gold medallist.

It was a surprise result for this young man from Aberdeen who won 1m springboard silver at last year’s European Junior Championships but whose only previous experience of the senior version came in 2023 when he was sixth in the mixed 10m synchro with another rising British talent, Maisie Bond.

Given the way he competed today, however, it will be no surprise to see him Penman back on another podium soon.

Rzeszutek took the lead in the fourth of the six rounds – and stayed there doggedly as rivals such as Wesemann, who had won the preliminaries with a score of 416.00, and Italy’s 18-year-old 2024 silver medallist Matteo Santoro rose and fell in the rankings.

Wesemann handicapped himself from the first after managing only 54.40 points from his opening dive, but put himself back in the game with successive scores of 78.20 and 85.75 before dipping back down to seventh place following a 43.20.

A monumental penultimate score of 91.20 – by far the largest of the day – for his Forward 4½ Somersaults with Tuck (109C) left the 23-year-old German sixth going into the final round, but only 11.00 points off the total of 363.75 Rzeszutek had reached by scoring 73.75.

The Pole, diving fourth in the order after finishing as the ninth of the morning’s 12 qualifiers, finished with a solid effort of 67.50 that yielded him what turned out to be a winning total of 431.25. Crucially, 67.50, which he scored twice, was his lowest total in any round, the high point coming in round three with an 81.60.

“I’m very, very happy to deliver this gold for my team and for Poland,” Rzeszutek told European Aquatics. “It’s an honour to be here with them. It was a hard week because we were fighting in other events as well and the best we had was fourth place, but now it’s a medal and it’s a gold.

“I wasn’t keeping the track of the competition. I was hearing about points that opponents had got but I wasn’t focusing on that. I was focusing on my game, on my dives – and that’s probably the key.

“My goal for this competition was to be consistent and produce the good, solid dives.”

Penman’s consistency also paid off, with his lowest score being 62.00 and his highest 83.30 in a total of 429.70.

“I was kind of coming here to get experience of being in a senior competition, I wasn’t really expecting to get a medal, I was hoping just to put out my best performance and go through my dives.

“So to nail all my dives – I’m so pleased to come away with a medal here in Antalya.

“Staying consistent throughout the whole day – I’m very pleased with how I did that. Matthew and I were right up with the best divers in Europe during that competition, so it was really great.

“I had no clue about the other scores. I just put my headphones on and listened as least I could. I don’t look at the scoreboard during the competition. I try to just focus on my six dives.

“It does feel a bit scary when some of these big guys are doing the hard dives and I’ve got a bit of an easier list. But it shows that if you do them well then you can still be up there.”

The weary Wesemann, last in the order, finished with a hugely creditable 74.10 score for a total of 426.85 that moved him onto the podium in place of Santoro.

The Italian had arrived at the final round in second place, just 3.00 behind Rzeszutek, but his last effort of 64.50 was not quite enough for a medal. Penman’s team-mate Matthew Dixon, the 2024 bronze medallist, finished fifth after putting together his own admirably steady set of dives.

“Of course I am a little bit disappointed, especially with the two dives where I wasn’t able to show as good as the other ones,” Wesemann said. “But still I am very happy with my bronze medal and most of my dives from today.

“Also that I was able to fight back even though I missed my first dive and my fourth dive. And afterwards I was still able to show beautiful dives, so I am very happy with that.

“It was a very exhausting European Championships right after our national championships at home, but I am very glad about how things have turned out here.

“We were able to bring back medals every day. And that is something very special that I think no one expected. When we came here we knew we had very high potential in most of the events, but that we were able to show this in pretty much every event and get a medal was just amazing.

“And being able to celebrate the medals with the team every night was just phenomenal.”

Finland’s 27-year-old Juho Junttila announced his retirement after the final, to warm applause.

Spain, second behind Great Britain in the diving medals table at last year’s European Aquatics Championships, got their first medal at Antalya 2025 on the last afternoon – but it was worth the wait.

A year after taking silver behind the Ukrainian pairing of Kseniia Bailo and Sofiia Lyskun in Belgrade, Antolino and 18-year-old Carvajal – respectively fourth and seventh in the women’s 10m platform individual event here -reversed the order as they claimed gold with a courageous display that earned them 305.82 points.

A score of 71.04 on their penultimate effort had earned them the lead from Ukraine going into the fifth and final round, but the margin of 9.30 meant they had to get the second of their two 3.2 degree difficulty dives spot on.

They smashed it, earning three 8.0s for synchronisation as part of a score of 74.88, the best of the competition.

Ukraine’s response, netting 64.80, earned silver on 286.44 ahead of the new German pairing of Pauline Pfeif and Carolina Coordes, who totalled 278.70 for bronze.

“We are really happy because we have trained a lot and we have improved our dives,” said Carvajal.

“I remember saying to Valeria right before that last dive that we would do it and the gold medal would be for us. So it was really satisfying to win. We were really nervous, but we still won.”

Reflecting on how her new partnership had worked out, Pfeif, who had previously won two silvers and a bronze, commented: “For the first time it’s really amazing, it’s like really good push for the year.

“We do have to work on the dives. We know that. And we can do better than we showed. But we are really happy about the bronze as well.”

Mike Rowbottom for European Aquatics