Artistic Swimming

[rlayt]

Whaaaat!? It’s astonishing how far swimming has come. I had no idea.

 

[Bob]

I know it’s crazy. I can’t imagine how you even begin to choreograph something like that and learn it.

 

[Indy]

That was insane! I don’t understand how physics lets half of those moves even happen. As someone who can barely even tread water, this sport has always impressed me.

 

[irichluck21]

It is also fascinating to understand the logistics behind the routines.
When I was at a diving camp at the USA Diving Center in Orlando, I was able to understand more about the sport since the diving well is also used by artistic swimming. The swimmers don’t actually hear the music, there are underwater speakers that boom and vibrate the water, which is how the swimmers know the cues.
They let me go under the water and played music so I could experience it myself and it was WILD.

 

[Indy]

That’s wild! I never thought about hearing the music but yeah it makes sense that they couldn’t hear it in the water. That has to take a crazy amount of practice to stay together, when you not only can’t always see each other’s entire bodies but also can’t hear the music. Having to go off the vibrations just adds to the level of impressive!

 

[MaryClare]

It’s very popular here (Russia). At top level it’s dominated by Russia and China so I’d guess the training methods require complete cultural apathy for human rights.

 

[JDB]

Artistic Swimming n the USA only started caring about safety protocols a few ago. But that’s on par with most sports here.

 

[MaryClare]

You don’t want to know what’s in the water

 

[JDB]

Here’s a video about camera technology being used in training.