Duet Finishes 13th in Tokyo

TOKYO – Lindi Schroeder and Anita Alvarez's Tokyo journey ended yesterday evening, as the duet failed to crack the top-12 and advance to the duet final. The USA duet entered day two of competition tied for 13th with Mexico. Their free routine, while a powerful performance, was not their best showing and the pair earned a score of 86.5333 on the opening day of artistic swimming competition. This score, despite significant improvement in the routine choreography, was lower than the score awarded at the qualification tournament in June. The routine produced 26s in both execution and difficulty and 34.5333 in artistic impression. 

With a nail-biting tie and Olympic finals in sight, the duo regrouped and prepared to come out strong in their tech routine. Additionally, the Greek duet was scratched from the tech competition program after a COVID-19 outbreak within the squad. Finals were within reach, and with the right performance, USA had a chance at securing a bid to finals.

Unfortunately, Alvarez and Schroeder did not have the near-perfect performance they needed to advance to finals. The pair scored an 86.1960, just .5 behind their closest competitor in Mexico. The routine was awarded 25.9 in execution, 25.9 in impression and 34.3960 for their completion of the required elements. USA executed the technical elements better than Mexico, edging them narrowly in the category that has the most weight in the final score, by .077. The deciding factor was in impression, where Mexico was able to separate themselves from USA by .5. 

In the end, the pair narrowly missed a trip to finals, ending the competition ranked 13th. They were accompanied by head coach Andrea Fuentes and High Performance Manager Lara Teixeira. There is certainly still much to be proud of, with the two athletes ranked among the top in the world in their discipline. Punching a ticket to Tokyo was an accomplishment itself, and nearly making it to finals is also a feat. Anita Alvarez is now a two-time Olympian, and Lindi Schroder will get to add three letters after her name for the first time. The Olympic spirit was present within the two and we look forward to seeing them continue to use their fire and passion to inspire our community. 

FINAL SCORES:
1. Russian Olympic Committee - 195.0079 
2. China - 191.7832
3. Ukraine - 188.7953
4. Japan - 187.2832
5. Canada - 182.7131
6. Italy - 182.3035
7. Austria - 180.8773
8. France - 175.9141
9. Netherlands - 175.4279
10. Belarus - 175.2434
11. Spain - 175.2281
12. Mexico - 173.1523
13. USA - 172.7293
14. Great Britain - 169.8881
15. Israel - 168.4913
16. Kazakhstan - 167.1005
17. Liechtenstein - 166.2822
18. Colombia - 164.0193
19. Egypt - 156.7625
20. Australia - 151.9010
21. South Africa - 143.0766
22. Greece - 88.1667 (DNS TD)