www.usaartisticswim.org
USA Artistic Swimming, the national governing body, has had much to celebrate. The USA won the silver medal in the team artistic swimming event at the Paris 2024 Olympics, ending a two-decade-long medal drought. After a 16-year absence from the event, the team’s strong performances across the technical, free and new acrobatic routines secured the silver medal behind China’s gold.
Sports Destination Management: The silver medal was an enormous high-water mark!
Adam Andrasko: It went beyond my wildest dreams. Everyone thought that the U.S. getting a medal was a crazy idea – until suddenly, it wasn’t. It really was a tribute to how much this team has trained and how hard they worked together to get where they are.
SDM: Has it helped boost participation?
Andrasko: It’s difficult to say. In an Olympic year, there is usually growth because people see the sport for the first time and become interested in it. The sport is also getting a lot of attention on social media and we watch those metrics closely; they are telling us there has been significant growth in awareness.
SDM: What obstacles do you see to the continued development of the sport?
Andrasko: It’s really challenging to start a club. You need a coach, obviously, and you need to have other clubs in the area for competition. At USA Artistic Swimming, we’re very focused on helping our clubs grow and develop.
SDM: Are there high school teams?
Andrasko: Right now, the only state in this country with high school clubs is Minnesota.
SDM: What about at the college level?
Andrasko: There are 27 universities across the country with artistic swimming programs. Five of those are varsity programs that offer scholarships.
SDM: Is artistic swimming popular in certain areas?
Andrasko: Yes. California is king of all aquatic sports in the country and an overwhelming majority of our athletes, maybe 80 percent, comes from there. In fact, our team trains at UCLA and 50 percent of all national team athletes come from California. Other states where you’ll see clubs and athletes are Florida, Texas and Arizona.
SDM: In 2024, we started seeing men in artistic swimming.
Andrasko: I think males are going to have a good place in the sport. At the same time, there is a brand new energy for women’s sports as a whole and artistic swimming is a female-centric sport.
SDM: What misconceptions do you think people have about artistic swimming?
Andrasko: The people who don’t understand this sport are generally those who have never been exposed to it. It’s not water ballet with Esther Williams; it is fast, it is powerful and there’s a lot of risk-taking. It is the most beautiful, most challenging sport in the world. Every destination out there wants to host something like that and when we come to town, people’s heads turn. It’s a great environment. Artistic swimming has this unique blend of energy and emotions that don’t come together in every sport.
SDM: What changes will we see in the team moving forward?
Andrasko: Andrea Fuentes, who coached the team to its silver medal, has left for an opportunity in her home country, Spain. That was a tough one for us but we have a new coach, Tammy McGregor, who was the head coach of the junior national team, and who has a strong background in the sport. She was a member of the team that won a gold medal in Atlanta in 1996. We have a lot of returning athletes from 2024 as well.
Of course, I wish I could celebrate that Olympic moment in Paris forever, but we’ve written our high-performance plan and we’re practicing again. I’ve learned firsthand that you have to take it day by day by day. There’s only one way to go and that’s up. There’s a gold medal to be grabbed and we’re working toward that. SDM
About the Author
