ARTISTIC swimming, anyone?
Compared to traditional swimming, artistic swimming sounds foreign to Filipino sports fans.
Here’s a crash course from swimmer and now artistic swimming coach Giella G. Sanchez (Maria Graciella Jasmina Sanchez).
She said that on her turf in Bacolod City, the event is quite popular and doing fine.
Sanchez said the 11th Asian Age Group Championships the country is hosting is a good opportunity to introduce the event to Filipinos. The championships started yesterday in Capaz, Tarlac, and will end on March 9.
Artistic swimming is one of the events in the competition aside from water polo, diving and traditional swimming.
“Mahirap po talagang maipakilala ang artistic swimming dahil hindi ito regular na nakikita ng ating mga kababayan. Artistic swimming is an Olympic sport, yes, and very popular sa international sports scene, pero dito sa atin, talagang medyo alien pa,” Sanchez said.
She said artistic swimming is a combination of gymnastics, swimming, and dancing.
Out to help stir interest in Artistic Swimming in the AAGC are Zoe Lim, 12, and Antonio Lucia Raffaele, 13.
“Zoe is from St. John’s Institute – Bacolod and Antonia is from St. Scholastica’s Academy – Bacolod. They both started with me, when they were three years old, in our learn to swim program, WeSwim Aquatics. And they started competing three years later.”
