To sync or swim that is the question?

by GuestJun 16, 2019Blog1 comment

Todays guest post is from Kate Davison, Synchronised Swimmer and Swim Buddy Network Member

Many people have asked me “how on earth did you get into sport like synchronised swimming?” It all started when I was around four years old. Dad decided that it would be a great idea to build a pool in the back garden. The pool was completed when I just turned five, but this now posed a dilemma.

I was five and a non-swimmer. All sorts of options had been considered to stop me falling in the pool – from electric fences (not very humane I didn’t think) to making it a greenhouse pool, not cool in summer. Well the answer came up when someone suggested synchronised swimming, especially as I seemed to be better at swimming under the water than on top of it.

Competition called Synchro World probably around 1996, swimming solo to music from the Fifth Element

Hippodrome circus Great Yarmouth in Peter Jay’s all new circus and water spectacular in 1999. Standing with the clowns and the juggler

So this little stick insect joined a synchronised swimming club preliminary course. It was a ten-week program designed to teach you the basics of synchronised swimming. At the end of the ten weeks I was performing a Ballet Leg (lying on your back with one leg extended perpendicular to the surface of the water), something which is not really done after only ten weeks. Needless to say after that I fell hook, line and “syncher” for the sport and have been participating in various ways over the last 34 years.

There have been many highlights during my competitive synchronised swimming career. The main ones were becoming an Age Group European silver medalist in duet and team in Vaxjo Sweden, swimming in the Junior and Senior Great British Teams from the ages of 13 to 18 and competing in various major competitions all over the globe. Two of my favourites were the Junior Worlds in Moscow, Russia and the Europeans in Seville, Spain. However my greatest competitive achievement was winning the British Championships in 1997 in solo and duet.

I then retired from competitive synchronised swimming but continued to work professionally within the sport. I have had some amazing experiences thanks to my unique skill. Whilst I was studying for my BSc Sport and Exercise Science degree at university I was able to fund my fees by working two summer seasons as a dancer and a Jan Baines Show swimmer at the Hippodrome Circus in Great Yarmouth. I was also involved in the “Dancing in the streets” world record attempt that was on BBC one for the highest number of dance styles all dancing the same routine in unison. We were swimming in the Trafalgar Fountains.

We returned to the Trafalgar Fountains one November to take part in another Guinness World Record attempt, where myself and my duet partner did the highest number of ballet switches in unison within one minute. Did I mention it was November?! For all you open water swimmers out there you’ll know how cold that was.

I have participated in shows all over the world, including swimming to a live band in Iceland. I even had the chance to perform in the Blue Lagoon. I have taken part in many charity events and adverts including Special K, Burger King and a Turkish chewing gum advert!

I have had many TV appearances, including working with Sam and Mark from children’s BBC on the program “Do Something Different”. I have worked on MTV’s “Bustamove”, and also had the great experience of working with Catherine Tate.

Things have calmed down more recently but I have been swimming as a Masters swimmer for the last 10 years. And even competed whilst heavily pregnant with my first baby. I now have two wonderful children, both of whom are little fish, and my daughter is already showing signs of following in her mummy’s wake.

Guinness World Record doing the highest number of ballet leg switches in synchronisation in one minute in the Trafalgar fountains London in 2006.

Want to share your own story with the Swim Buddy Network? Drop us an email at info@swimbuddynetwork.com

To sync or swim that is the question?

Todays guest post is from Kate Davison, Synchronised Swimmer and Swim Buddy Network Member

Want to share your own story with the Swim Buddy Network? Drop us an email at info@swimbuddynetwork.com

1 Comment