The Estevan Mermaids synchronized swim club is among the local sports clubs experiencing a different year in the 2020-21 season, but they have been meeting and are looking forward to a virtual competition.
The club was able to start practising early this year, because the RM of Estevan Aquatic Centre’s annual shutdown was held in the spring instead of the fall. Normally the Mermaids’ season doesn’t begin until October.
“So far this year, we’ve been focusing a lot, at the beginning, on figures,” said club communications co-ordinator Amanda Fonstad. “Their first competition in November, they have a series of just figures in the water – one of them is a ballet leg and another is the barracuda.”
But there is also a dryland component to synchronized swimming that requires athletes to be fit in and out of the water, so the Mermaids have an hour of dryland training twice a week with a fitness coach.
Swimmers have to perform headstands and splits outside of the water.
The Mermaids have approximately 30 members split between four teams: a junior team, a 15-and-under team, a 12-and-under team and a limited to competition team for those 10 years of age and younger. The latter team will only compete at provincials at the end of the season.
“We have a decent number of athletes,” said Fonstad. “Most of our teams have eight athletes as an average, so we’re lucky because we don’t have to worry about splitting them up because our numbers are too big.”
Included in the swimmer count is a high performance athlete, Haley Copeland. The Mermaids have nine certified coaches.
Their first competition is coming in November: the Marnie Eistetter Figures Meet. It will be a digital competition.
“Our athletes will be performing in our pool here, and we will be recording them, and then sending the recordings to Saskatchewan Artistic Swimming to then be judged and marked,” said Fonstad.
The athletes will only get one chance to successfully perform their routine, since they only get one shot at a live competition. They will perform the routine the same way they would during an in-person meet. The judges will make their evaluations based on the video.
The meet would have happened Nov. 28 and 29.
Thus far, it appears the other meets will happen virtually as well.
The club is in the midst of a fundraising campaign, in which they will sell Purdy’s chocolates prior to Christmas. The deadline to purchase chocolates is Nov. 16.
Fonstad said the swimmers are happy to be able to be involved in something and to be active and have some sort of a season. They have come a long ways since the first practice on Sept. 8, and the extra pool time has helped them a lot.
