Chris Mears has insisted that he will bring his "A-game" to the Royal Commonwealth Pool in Edinburgh this evening for the Commonwealth Games 1m springboard final after he easily qualified earlier today.
Mears, 21, registered the third-best score of the preliminaries with 383.40, behind teammate Jack Laugher (435.30) and Australia's Matthew Mitcham (383.65), to earn his place in the final at 6pm this evening.
After his last dive, he told Sports Mole: "I didn't know how today was going to go because I've only done three 1m training sessions in the last two months. I haven't done a load of preparation for this, I just wanted to come and smash it up really, which is what I've done.
"I showed that I'm competitive in a high-standard group of people and came out third. I feel like I could have been second, but what does it matter - it's only a prelim. I'll bring my A-game for the final.
"I know that I can bring a lot more than that, I reckon my top-end territory is around 410, so I think if I can come out in the final and score 410 then I could be in with a chance of a medal."
Mears is best friends with Laugher and the pair dive in the synchronised events together. He said that it made no difference to be competing against his friend.
"It's absolutely no different, we still sit together as if we're diving together and then we go and do our own thing," he added.
"Obviously there's a nice healthy competition because we both want to beat each other. You know, that's only good for us.
"We both watch each other's dives and applaud each other on. We've both done well and hopefully we can do so again in the final."
Mears and Laugher will be going for gold in the synchronised 3m springboard final on Friday morning.
Pascal Lemesre
