The 2023 Artistic Swimming World Cup,
part of the World Aquatics Festival, wrapped up today with the final three
events. Artistic swimmers from Mexico came to the eastern shores of Egypt and
left their mark in Somabay.
Mexico won two of the final three
events on offer during the third and final day and added a bronze medal in the
third event with brand-new routines that were swum in competition for the first
time.
Spain, with three gold, one silver,
and two bronze medals, tops the medal table, ahead of Mexico and China.
Duet Free Women
The Mexican duet Nuria Diosdado
Garcia and Joana Jimenez Garcia, who just missed the podium in the Technical
event yesterday, performed a technically difficult routine to win the gold
medal, Mexico’s second gold medal in Somabay. The pair scored a total of
325.6584 points, 31.55 for difficulty, for their presentation of “The flight of
the Phoenix Bird”.
After another historic win for Mexico
in Somabay, Jimenez Garcia reflected on what this meant.
“Today was our first competition with
this routine. For us, this was a super spectacular result. To take the win for
Mexico in the Free Duet and the Acrobatic, we’re grateful for the opportunity
that life gives us. We’re trying to get better and better every day.”
Diosdado Garcia noted the
opportunities that the new scoring system provides for athletes.
“Winning the gold medal with this new
scoring system was amazing. We declared a high degree of difficulty for this
routine, and we made it, we executed it. With the new scoring system, if you
have a high difficulty and you do it, you’ll have a high score.”
Jimenez Garcia also laid out the
duet’s upcoming aspirations:
“We have the goal to get the goal at
the Central American Games and qualify through the Pam American Games for the
Paris 2024 Olympics.” By Joana Jimenez Garcia
Representing the Netherlands, Bregje
de Brouwer and Marloes Steenbeek moved up one step on the podium from the
technical event to claim the silver medal with the routine “Werewolves”. The
Dutch scored 317.0250 points for their swim to the music which was composed
specially by Alexis Maldiney to fit this terror fantasy routine.
The Italian duo of Alessia Macchi and
Susanna Pedotti earned bronze, scoring 296.4458 points for their “Panthers” routine. The choreography was
performed to the cover of the classic song “No Woman, No Cry” by Tems from the
movie “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever”.
Mixed Duet Free
Spain’s Fernando Diaz del Rio Soto
and Mireia Hernandez Luna showed a remarkable improvement with their routine
“Angels and Demons” throughout the 2023 World Cup season.
In Markham, the pair scored 194.5083
improving to 267.8917 in Montpellier, and today their performance, swum to
music by Hans Zimmer from the original soundtrack to the movie, earned them
277.6875 points and the gold medal.
Diaz del Rio Soto won the technical
event with partner Emma Garcia earlier this weekend. “We’re so happy with all
the steps we’ve done.”
Hernandez Luna shared: “We have a few
improvements to make before the next competition in Oviedo (Spain). Since we
competed in Montpellier one week ago, we changed our choreography so we’re
proud of this.”
The Colombian mixed duo Gustavo
Sanchez and Jennifer Cerquera Hatiusca has won medals in each Mixed event they
competed in this season, however, this is their first silver medal. The
routine-themed “The King and the Queen” scored 256.4708 points.
Itzamary Gonzalez Cuellar and Diego
Villalobos Carrillo of Mexico won their first-ever medal at a World Cup event
with the routine “La Llorona.” The Mexican pair received 255.3417 points, to
add a bronze medal to the Mexican collection in Somabay.
Acrobatic
The exciting and breathtaking
Acrobatic routines, showcasing seven different acrobatic moves tied together by
a choreography, once again did not disappoint.
Mexico’s routine used the music
exceptionally well. It creatively connected the difficult acrobatic moves,
which included an exceptional balancing platform and several throws and
handstands that would be difficult to do even when dry and on land. For their
swim Mexico was awarded 227.6626 points and their second gold medal in the team
events in Somabay.
Sharing the excitement of being at
the World Cup event in Egypt was a double gold medal member of the Mexican
team, Regina Alferez Licea.
“It’s been a really rough year, you
know? With a lot of political problems in Mexico. First, we’re really proud to
be here and with our performance, it was just amazing for us. We’re just so
happy and grateful. We love the routine we did today. What we feel, we like to
express to the judges. And that’s what we really did today.”
By Regina Alferez Licea
Alferez Licea also noted the unique
preparations that the Acrobatic routines demand of athletes:
“It’s different from the rest of the
routines. It’s easier to enjoy because you’re not as worried about the
difficulty of the hybrids, and work more on the lifts,” Alferez Licea said. “In
Mexico, we train a lot of lifts – we just enjoy this more dynamic way to swim.
In Mexico, we have a coach especially focused on this training.”
In a close race for second place
between Kazakhstan and France, Kazakhstan’s success in the Team events in
Somabay continued when they were awarded 210.0042 points for their performance
today, enough to claim the silver medal ahead of the team from France, who
scored 208.9208 points.
The rules for Acrobatic events allow
for up to two males to be part of the eight-member team. Kazakhstan was the
only one of the five participating teams to have one male, Artur Maidanov, in
their lineup.
Bronze medal winner France competed
with the routine “Zombies” swam to Michael Jackson’s Thriller was fun to watch
from beginning to end. The French athletes interpreted the theme very well with
their facial expressions and arm and leg movements. Although their Execution
and Difficulty scores were lower than that of Mexico and Kazakhstan, their
Artistic Impression score of 86.2 was well deserved and topped the rest of the
field.
Coming Up Next | Super Final
For the athletes, this final leg of
the Artistic Swimming World Cup is the last opportunity to score points to
qualify for participation in the Super Final of the World Cup, scheduled for
2-4 June in Oviedo, Spain.
National federations are ranked in
four categories: Solo (Technical & Free), Duet (Technical & Free),
Mixed Duet (Technical & Free), and Team (Technical, Free & Acrobatic).
The first twelve ranked National
Federations in each category are allowed to take part in the Super Final in
Oviedo.
Written by Maureen Croes, World
Aquatics correspondent
No comments:
Post a Comment