The Chinese synchronized¹ swimming pair of Jiang Tingting and Jiang Wenwen will vie for the first medal in the event today in the duet finals.

Ranked third after the technical and free routines preliminary, the twin sisters are eyeing a podium finish in the 12-pair finals.

"We did a better job than Tuesday at the technical routine, and we added some more difficulty at the beginning of the program to show our synchronization²," said Wenwen after the free routine preliminary Tuesday.

Apolline Dreyfuss and Lila Meessemann-Bakir of France perform in the synchronized swimming duet free routine preliminary round August 19 2008.

"I hope we improve in the swimming speed and interpretation³, and do better tomorrow."

In the technical routine preliminary on Monday, Wenwen made a mistake in the end, which caused the sisters to slip behind archrival Japan's Saho Harada and Emiko Suzuki, who were adjudged third.

Defending Olympic champions Anastasia Davydova and Anastasia Ermakova from Russia went into the finals after two preliminaries, followed by Gemma Mengual and Andrea Fuentes of Spain.

But the Japanese pair shared the same points with the Jiangs in the free routines preliminary Tuesday.

Under the Japanese coach Masayo Imura, the Chinese duo beat the Japanese pair at the 2006 Doha Asian Games with flawless performances, but little separates the two pairs.

Harada and Suzuki were members of the Olympic silver medalist team at the 2004 Athens Games.

Another Chinese pair Zhang Xiaohuan and Gu Beibei finished seventh in the duet event at the 2004 Athens Games, where the Chinese team ranked sixth in the team finals.

"The Japanese pair are better than us in control and strength, but our synchronization is better," said Wenwen.

"We will make further improvement in the finals and strive for a medal."

The coach is also looking forward to lift the Chinese pair to higher ranking at the Games.

"The Chinese synchronized swimmers had no Olympic medal before and have to improve from the seventh ranking, so we have no pressure at all," said Imura, considered Japan's "godmother" of synchronized swimming before coming to coach the Chinese team at the beginning of last year.

The points from the technical routine preliminary will be counted in today's finals. Heading in, the two Jiangs are 0.166 points behind their Japanese rivals.