Gloucester Synchro members (l to r) Heather Potter, Dana Bloom, Angela Beanlands, Kiera Bloom and Amy Morrow are all members of the Colonel By Cougars water polo team. Fred Sherwin/Photo

By night they're mild mannered synchronized swimmers. By day they're battle hardened water polo players ready to put their synchro skills to the test in a sport that is a lot rougher than it looks.

"Synchro is graceful and calm. Water polo is vicious," says Dana Bloom who is a rookie on the Colonel By Cougars varsity water polo team as well as a member of the Gloucester Synchro Tier 6 squad.

Gloucester Synchro members have done double duty on the Colonel By water polo team ever since it was first formed in 2002. Seventeen-year-old Angela Beanlands was one of three original members along with fellow Gloucester Synchro members Jen Bowman and Katie Mackenzie.

In their first year of existence the Cougars won a handful of games and finished in seventh place. The very next year they finished in first place and made it all the way to the city championships before losing 3-2 to Samuel Genest.

Beanlands can still remember her first water polo game and finding out just how rough the sport can get.

"The first girl that was with me never touched me, but then the next girl was all over me. I thought she was trying to drown me," recalls Beanlands.

Although water polo players are supposed to keep their fingernails cut short, scratches are a common occurrence. Other hazards of the sport include the occasional poke in the eye, sore ribs, elbows to the head and charley horses.

While water polo can be a rough sport, the Colonel By Cougars are known as one of the cleaner teams in the NCSSAA.

"We don't pride ourselves on being a rough team. We pride ourselves on being able to swim faster. We score a lot of goals on breakaways," says Beanlands.

After her first year in the sport, Beanlands eventually talked Heather Potter into playing, who in turn convinced Amy Morrow to join them. Kiera Bloom, 16, joined the team last year followed by sister Dana.

All five girls agree one of the major advantages of playing water polo is the fact that the game is decided in the water as opposed to synchronized swimming where your fate is decided by a panel of judges.

"In water polo the team that scores the most goals wins," says Kiera Bloom. "Synchro can be really political."

All five girls also agree that synchronized swimming makes them better water polo players and vice versa.

"Synchro swimmers definitely have an advantage, especially in the deep end where we can use the egg beater," says Potter referring to the leg movement synchro swimmers use to stay elevated in the water.

Conversely water polo provides the synchronized swimmers with an excellent workout.Besides working on their egg beater, they normally have to swim several lengths of the pool during the course of a game.

Beanlands, Potter and Morrow all compete on the Gloucester Synchro Tier 7 junior squad, while Kiera Bloom competed on the Tier 6 Select team which won a silver medal at the recent Ontario Synchronized Swimming Championships.

Beanlands also competes on the Tier 7 senior team which picked up a silver medal at the provincial championships and she was a member of the Gloucester Synchro varied team that won a gold medal at last year's Canadian championships.

All five girls will be competing at the Eastern Divisionals at the Nepean Sportsplex next weekend.