MacLennan and Cockburn upset Chinese favourites, win gold and silver at final trampoline World Cup before Olympics

June 25, 2012 at 9:43 am | Posted in Results, Trampoline | 1 Comment
Tags: Karen Cockburn, Rosie MacLennan, Samantha Smith, Trevor Stirling

High flying Olympic medal contenders Rosie MacLennan and Karen Cockburn, both of Toronto, upset Chinese stars Shanshan Huang and Li Dan to win gold and silver respectively at the final trampoline World Cup before Games on Saturday.

MacLennan and Cockburn qualified third and fourth in the prelims but stepped up their performance in the final to share a World Cup podium for the first time.

MacLennan won her second career World Cup gold medal with a score of 55.605 points with Cockburn a close second at 55.125.

Huang, the 2009 world champion, took the bronze with a score of 55,050 and 2010 world champion Li Dan ended up off the podium in fourth at 54.70.

Both Cockburn and MacLennan went into their final competition before the Olympics eager to prove the formidable Chinese team was not unbeatable.

“We wanted to do strong routines and hoped to push one of the Chinese off the podium but we never expected to come first and second,” said MacLennan, who was runner-up at last year’s world championships.

Cockburn, who’d like nothing more than to cap her extraordinary career with a record fourth straight Olympic medal, also admitted a 1-2 finish seemed almost too good to be true.

“It’s kind of surreal, the Chinese didn’t fall and they did good routines, so we’re kind of shocked,” said Cockburn, who has won two silvers and a bronze in three Olympic Games.

“It’s the best we good have ever hoped for at the last World Cup before the Olympics. Now we have to go home and keep working on the little details and hopefully we can both be on the podium at the Olympics. That would be amazing.”

In the women’s synchro event, Mariah Madigan and Samantha Smith, both of Toronto, placed seventh in the final, and brothers Keegan and Kyle Soehn of Red Deer, Alta., were fourth on the men’s side.

In the Nissen Cup junior event, Keevan Madigan and Trevor Stirling, both of Toronto, were fourth in men’s synchro and Lexi Geisbrecht of Calgary and Bronte Dundas of Toronto were seventh on the women’s side.