>>>USA Synchro

Memorable Masters Moments

Laura Alt from Ramapo Aqua Masters...

My most "infamous" moment happened at the National meet in 1991 in Oklahoma City, OK. My four teammates and I were practicing the platform lift. I was the "liftee", standing on Sue Bessette, the coach of the Aqua Masters. She would layout underwater. I would ball up and get my feet planted and try to stand up at the right time. The others pushed. After a successful lift, as we broke apart, I felt my elbow hit something. That was Sue's right eyebrow. It started to swell. It turned all kinds of colors. Her trio partners used blue and green eyeshadow to match her. And, of course, this was the year she was received the May McEwan award. She still has a scar. Sue told me each morning as she puts on her make-up, she thinks of me!

Linda S. Thomson from the D.C. Synchromasters...

I think this year's Masters National Championships in Keuka would definitely qualify as a "Synchro Moment." Our team had planned to be at the Keuka pool on Saturday morning in time to cheer our 70's duet. Our duet went over early for warm-ups. About ten minutes before we were to leave for the pool, we received a phone call from one of our team mates at the pool (thank goodness for cell phones!) saying that if we looked out across the lake we would probably see a big black cloud of smoke headed our way. Turns out that during an overnight rain storm the power had gone out at the college and when they tried to bring it back up, the transformer burst into flames. Needless to say, we would not be having our full day of competition at that pool on Saturday!

Meet Manager, Nancy Wightman, called around to a couple of other schools in the area and found Hobart College (approximately 30 minutes away) could accomodate us. So, sound system, scoring system, judges, officials, lifeguards, volunteers, vendors, swimmers, food, etc. were all transported to Hobart, where we started approximately five hours late and
finished up only two and half hours behind schedule! Our banquet had to be cancelled, but the experience will definitely give us something to talk about for years to come!

Kudos to EVERYONE who contributed to making the 2002 Masters Nationals a success!

Jonathan Ortiz from California's Unsyncables...

When my friend Lilia Preston and I decided to go to the 1998 National Masters Championship in Beaverton, Oregon we got excited. We only had three weeks to come up with a routine and we had no coach but each other to help. At that time we registered under a club calles Team Atlantis. It was time for our duet routine and I was suffering from bronchitis, coughing up a storm and Lilia was very nervous. We sucked it up and took our positions. The meet by that time was pretty dead and it seemed like no one was alive. So here we are, don't know why we decided to compete, no classical music in our routine like the rest of the competition. Our music started off with a very loud baritone saxophone and we went into some hard-core latin slasa rock. We woke everyone up. The audience was cheering and clapping - we could hear them underwater. We might of finished last but the drive the crowd gave us was amazing. Spectators and athletes took pictures with us, that was cool. So we just competed again last year in Arizona. Again, a last minute decision, but now with the Unsyncables and Dawn Bean by our side. What can I say, except third place was not expected. See you in New York 2002!

Claire Shannon remembers her favorite synchro moment...

My friend told me to stand on the side of the pool and make her laugh. I was doing this thing that she had shown me that just made us crack up so much. So when she looked at me straight in the eye I did the little thing we did and she cracked up in the middle of the routine and when she got out the coach just said "Great smile now just make the rest of the team do that." So from this day forward the A team knows the joke and is now laughing as I do it on the side of the pool and they ALWAYS smile!

Dawn from the Southern California Unsyncables writes...

As reported by my 50-59 year old team, which had two brand new 50+ members both in their first meet, while they waited for the whistle to blow...one said, "oh my God" (meaning what am I doing here?). The other said, "I hope he hears you." The rest of the team was laughing to themselves so hard, they thought they almost couldn't compete.