News
Two Medals for USA at First World Cup in Canada
by Alyssa Jacobs, USA Artistic Swimming
The senior national team collected two medals across three events this weekend at the World Aquatics World Cup in Markham, Canada. The new scoring system proved to shake things up at the first competition of 2023 and the team has potential to achieve remarkable things this season thanks to hard work on technical development in the off season and expertly constructed routines.
Perhaps the most exciting moment of the weekend came from the technical team category. The work done by the coaching staff and athletes to craft and execute a routine with both difficulty and creativity paid off and the Michael Jackson routine earned USA a silver medal behind Japan and in front of Israel. The technical team finished just 5.3 points behind the Japanese who have long been dominant in the sport. In fact, USA had the highest scores for difficulty and execution, but were edged by Japan in artistic impression. The senior team showed exceptional precision and synchronization and have already elevated the high bar they set last season.
Megumi Field and Calista Liu represented the USA in the largest category of the weekend, the technical duet category. They finished in sixth place unofficially, but because World Aquatics only allows one entry per country to be officially ranked, USA ended fifth in the final results. The pair collected high marks for difficulty and artistic impression but fell short in execution compared to the duets that finished above them. Overall, they displayed a solid first outing together and have time to refine their execution ahead of the next World Cup.
To close out the competition, USA earned a bronze medal in the acrobatic category. The routine was packed with extremely difficult highlights. The amazon-themed performance was solid and showed bravery by the athletes, with room for slight improvement in execution of some of the highlights. Ukraine took the gold and Japan took the silver, with USA clinching the last podium spot ahead of Canada, Israel, Spain and Australia. The acrobatic routine also topped the charts in difficulty scores.
Full results from the weekend can be found on the World Aquatics website HERE. Replays from competition can be found on the World Aquatics YouTube channel HERE.
The next time the team will compete will be the World Cup hosted in Montpellier, France in May. This gives the squad about a month and a half to digest the results from stop number one and strategize how to increase scores ahead of France. It’s likely the level of participation, and competition, at the next stop will be higher due to the European location and Team USA has proved they are up for the challenge.
Perhaps the most exciting moment of the weekend came from the technical team category. The work done by the coaching staff and athletes to craft and execute a routine with both difficulty and creativity paid off and the Michael Jackson routine earned USA a silver medal behind Japan and in front of Israel. The technical team finished just 5.3 points behind the Japanese who have long been dominant in the sport. In fact, USA had the highest scores for difficulty and execution, but were edged by Japan in artistic impression. The senior team showed exceptional precision and synchronization and have already elevated the high bar they set last season.
Megumi Field and Calista Liu represented the USA in the largest category of the weekend, the technical duet category. They finished in sixth place unofficially, but because World Aquatics only allows one entry per country to be officially ranked, USA ended fifth in the final results. The pair collected high marks for difficulty and artistic impression but fell short in execution compared to the duets that finished above them. Overall, they displayed a solid first outing together and have time to refine their execution ahead of the next World Cup.
To close out the competition, USA earned a bronze medal in the acrobatic category. The routine was packed with extremely difficult highlights. The amazon-themed performance was solid and showed bravery by the athletes, with room for slight improvement in execution of some of the highlights. Ukraine took the gold and Japan took the silver, with USA clinching the last podium spot ahead of Canada, Israel, Spain and Australia. The acrobatic routine also topped the charts in difficulty scores.
Full results from the weekend can be found on the World Aquatics website HERE. Replays from competition can be found on the World Aquatics YouTube channel HERE.
The next time the team will compete will be the World Cup hosted in Montpellier, France in May. This gives the squad about a month and a half to digest the results from stop number one and strategize how to increase scores ahead of France. It’s likely the level of participation, and competition, at the next stop will be higher due to the European location and Team USA has proved they are up for the challenge.
World Cup: Markham
11 photos