Standing on the podium at the 2023 World Aquatics Youth Artistic Swimming Championships held in Athens, Greece, from Aug. 30 to Sept. 3, sophomore Sophia Tsives felt an overwhelming sense of pride and accomplishment. As part of the U.S. Youth National Team, Tsives’ team placed third out of 12 countries in the Team Free event at the end of the 4-day competition, with Japan finishing first followed by Spain.
From over 100 top swimmers in the country ranging from ages 13-15, Tsives was one of the 12 accepted into the Youth National Team after passing an extensive qualification process in January. She was required to pass a land and water test — which assessed endurance and speed swimming — and perform individual and group artistic routines to show off her technical abilities.
Qualifying for the Youth National Team for the second time — first in 2022 and now in 2023 — Tsives traveled to Las Vegas over the summer to train for eight weeks with other elite swimmers from all over the nation to prepare for the World Championships. After training, the team flew to Athens in August to compete. Having spent so much time together, they formed deep friendships.
Tsives started the sport at age 7 after seeing an ad for an artistic swimming summer camp. The sport, previously known as synchronized swimming, combined aspects of what she had already been doing — swimming and gymnastics — so she decided to give it a try. After quickly developing a strong passion for the sport, she joined the Santa Clara Aquamaids, an artistic swimming club, and has been swimming there ever since.
During the school year, Tsives trains with the Aquamaids six days a week, for four to five hours per day on weekdays and up to six on weekends. Competition season for artistic swimming starts around March and local club nationals take place in April before the team is off on break for the summer. However, since she made the Youth National Team in early May, Tsives continued to train over the summer.
Due to competitions with the Santa Clara Aquamaids and the National Team, Tsives frequently travels around the nation. The 2023 World Championships, however, was her first time competing outside the country.
“[In 2022], the World Championships were hosted in America, so this year it was really interesting to compete in another country,” Tsives said. “It’s really fascinating to see how the other teams do compared to us.”
Though she has an intense practice schedule and travels frequently, Tsives said she tries her hardest to balance her artistic swimming hours with her school work. For the most part, her competitions line up with school breaks, but when they don’t, she finds that catching up can be extremely difficult and she often needs to squeeze in homework when she has downtime during competitions.
In her remaining years in high school, Tsives hopes to qualify and compete with the Junior National Team, for athletes ages 16-19. She also looks to continue pursuing the sport after graduation.
“My goal is to get recruited into a top college with a great artistic swimming program like Stanford, UC Berkeley or UCLA and continue my swimming journey there,” Tsives said.
