Canada's Simoneau advances to 2 synchro finals at world championships

Canadian Jacqueline Simoneau advanced to the finals in two separate synchronized swimming events after strong preliminary-round performances on Friday at the FINA World Championships.

Swimmer qualifies for solo and duet technical events

Jacqueline Simoneau of Canada performs during the women's solo technical event at the FINA swimming world championships in Budapest. (Zsolt Czegledi/AP)

Canadian Jacqueline Simoneau advanced to the finals in two separate synchronized swimming events after strong preliminary-round performances on Friday at the FINA World Championships.

The 20-year old from Montreal first qualified for Saturday's solo technical final, then advanced to Sunday's final in the duet technical event with partner Claudia Holzner of Calgary.

Simoneau scored 89.2331 points in the solo prelim, performing her routine to the music of The Red Violin Soundtrack, for a fifth-place finish. The top 12 athletes from the field of 32 competitors advance.

Russia's Svetlana Kolesnichenko was first, Ona Carbonell of Spain was second and Yukiko Inui of Japan was third.

Later in the day, Simoneau joined the 23-year-old Holzner and swam to a strong seventh-place finish in the duet prelims to book their spot in Sunday's final.

Russian pair Svetlana Kolesnichenko and Alexandra Patskevich were first while Chinese twins Jiang Tingting and Jiang Wenwen were second. Ukrainian duo Anna Voloshyna and Yelyzaveta Yakhno were third.