SINGAPORE - Japan took the artistic swimming team free silver medal at the world aquatics championships Sunday in Singapore. Japan scored 334.7232 points to earn a medal in the discipline for the fourth straight world championships. China won gold with 348.4779, while Spain rounded out the podium with 321.1328. It was a positive result for Japan as more than half of its squad were replaced after the nation, traditionally strong in artistic swimming, was shut out of the medals at last year's Paris Olympics. "We tried to finish as high as possible," said Tomoka Sato, 23, a Paris Games holdover and captain of the team in Singapore. In the team free routine preliminary round a day earlier, Japan was third behind China and Spain.