Canadians Tied for Fifth in Technical Team Routine
August 22, 2008, BEIJING: The Canadian Synchro Team is poised for success after
a well-executed team technical program at the Olympic Games in Beijing, China
today. The team is tied for fifth place with their American rivals, who are also
the defending Olympic bronze medalists, and are set to impress the Chinese crowd
and Olympic judges with their dynamic free routine tomorrow.
"We felt great in the water today,” says team member Tracy Little of
Pointe-Claire, Que. “We accomplished what we wanted to do performance-wise and
showed the crowd and the judges that we are still in medal contention. We have
an amazing team free routine and we're quite excited for tomorrow."
The Canadian squad earned a score of 47.584, close to two-tenths of a point
improvement on their technical score from the Olympic Qualifying event earlier
this year. Their technical routine score will be added to tomorrow’s free
routine score to determine their final ranking.
The world champions and 2004 Olympic champions from Russia laid claim to the
leader position, with 49.500 points, just over half of a point lead on the
second-place team from Spain (48.917). Home crowd favourites from China surged
ahead of the Japanese team to seat themselves in third spot with 48.584 points.
Japan was fourth with 48.167 points.
Athletes Marie Pier Boudreau-Gagnon (Riviere du Loup, Que.), Little, Dominika
Kopcik (Surrey, BC), Elise Marcotte (L’Ancienne-Lorette, Que.), Marie-Pierre
Gagne (Montreal, Que.), Jessika Dubuc (Mercier, Que.), Jennifer Song (Calgary,
Alta.), and Eve Lamoureux (Montreal, Que.), with alternates Isabelle Rampling
(Burlington, Ont.) make up the team.
The Canadian team and their coaches Denise Sauve and Julie Sauve return to the
pool tomorrow in the hopes of moving up in the rankings after performing their
free program.
Synchro Canada is the national governing body for the sport of synchronized
swimming in Canada. We support the development of synchro athletes, officials
and coaches at all levels. Speedo and Eco-Fusion are proud sponsor of Canada’s
national synchro teams.
For more information:
Claire Carver-Dias
Synchro Canada
Marketing and Communications
416.788.9367
communications@synchro.ca