Flash and sizzle reigns in synchronized swimming, but there is as much hard work, grit and preseverence.
Those routines don't come easy - even if it looks that way.
The 12-member Canadian national team showed both Thursday in its performance during the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Canadian open synchronized swimming championships at the CARI Complex in Charlottetown.
Teammates Marie-Lou Morin, 19, and Cassidy Beaver-Nicol, 22, talked to the Guardian after the exhibition, one they considered important as the team preps for its next event, the Spanish Open in June.
Canada swept the team competition at the German Open last month in Bonn, Germany.
"This is like a practice competition," said Morin, a Montreal native "A step to build the team up."
The Charlottetown Naiads synchro club last hosted the nationals, which run until Sunday, in 1994.
Its taken eight months to plan the event and about 260 volunteers are on hand.
One-hundred fifty-three swimmers, including 11 from the Naiads and swimmers from France, Sri Lanka and Puerto Rico, are geared up to compete.
Morin is two-year member of the national team and in her fourth year in the national system.
She started 10 years ago when an aunt, involved in the sport, encouraged her to try synchro and it stuck.
Beaver-Nicol is also a four-year veteran of the national system.
She's spent 14 years in the pool after doctors in Kamloops, B.C., diagnosed the former gymnast with scoliosis (spine curved side-to-side) as a child and suggested swimming as physiotherapy.
She never climbed out of the water.
And, like Morin, she has spent two years training with the national team.
They can hear the music, it's piped in through underwater speakers, although different sound systems sound different in the pool and can make for on-the-fly changes on counts and cues after practice sessions.
It's key because the music is huge part of what they do.
The swimmers and coaches divvy up the routine-building, each suggesting music and moves.
"It's pretty big," said Morin. "It's part of your motivation."
Beaver-Nicol agreed.
"When you have the music you perform with more vigour."
And the judges can tell, said Morin, if you're phoning in a performance
"(They can detect) plastic smiles."
So have they ever struggled through dull routines and boring music?
"Once or twice in my early days of synchro," said Beaver-Nicol, with a laugh.
Today, the national team will share those and other tips to about 100 girls to students from Eliot River, West Kent and Westwood schools. After a talk, the group hits the water.
"I love doing it," said Beaver-Nicol. "Brings you back to your basics."
And the suit with its maple leaf in the middle of the chest carries a certain weight, too.
"It says I worked really hard to wear this suit," said Beaver-Nicol.
"It's your job. You're here and you have a job to do," said Morin.
Naiads competing are Lisa Bondt, Bridget Carter, Katie Carter, Lauren Hardy, Hailey Hennessey, Victoria MacQuaid, MaryBeth McInnis, Jessica Patenaude, Rachel Waddell, Michaela Walsh and Samantha Yazdani.
Competition continues today at 7:45 a.m.
