Two girls gracefully slide into the water, kicking and descending in unison, only to burst up above the surface and strike a pose. Freshmen Ira and Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan are synchronized swimmers on Cambridge Synchro, a local synchronized swimming team.

The all-female sport mixes dance and swimming to create artistic routines in the water.

“It’s a combination of gymnastics, swimming and choreography and being creative. So basically you do things to music and it’s a big athletic challenge,” Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan said.

Ira Ter-Ovanesyan said that she and her sister decided to try synchronized swimming a few years ago when they became tired of simply swimming laps back and forth in the pool.

“Once we started doing synchronized swimming it was pretty fun. We got placed into age groups right away because we were good at swimming. We got good really fast,” Ira Ter-Ovanesyan said.

Furthermore, according to Ira Ter-Ovanesyan, working with a twin is beneficial, and easier, in a sport where synchronization is crucial.

“We’re almost genetically synchronized, so we don’t have to try as much as other duets to be synchronized. Every movement that would be different for every other person–we have it naturally the same way,” Ira Ter-Ovanesyan said.

The twins will be performing a duet set to music from “Puss in Boots the Movie” at the next meet. According to Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan, their duet was choreographed by coach Rita Gillan and they have been working diligently on it.

“This year we wanted to choreograph our routine with her so we worked on it over the summer. By the time we started this season we already knew our duet so that was pretty nice,” Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan said.

According to Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan, many people misconceive synchronized swimming as something other than a sport.

“If you look online there are a lot of people saying that it’s not even a sport. But I want to see a basketball player try to survive one of our practices. It would be fun to watch,” said Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan. The practices are physically challenging and include strength and flexibility training and learning new elements for the routines.

In synchronized swimming, each group of girls, whether it be a duet (two swimmers), a trio (three swimmers) or a team (four to eight swimmers), must choreograph and practice a routine to music. According to Cambridge Synchro’s head coach Katie Rice, all routines consist of certain elements.

“There’ll always be a series of movements where you’re doing what we call an eggbeater with your legs, where you’re treading water and doing different moves with your arms above the water,” Rice said. “Another, with your head above the water and kicking on your side is called side flutter, while you’re doing moves and things with your arms. And all routines can contain hybrids where your torso is underwater and your legs are doing different moves.”

Synchronized swimming meets have two parts: the team routine and the figures, which are basic moves and elements that swimmers must do individually in front of the judges. According to Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan, the figures can be intimidating.

“The more of your body that is sticking out of the water, the better, and you just have to show control. That’s probably the scariest part of the meet because you’re just alone and there are four judges and you’re sitting there doing your figure and it’s so easy to mess up,” Vicka Ter-Ovanesyan said.

Routines are scored by whether the routine has all of the right elements, level of synchronization and overall look.

“A big part of it is it being very pretty. It doesn’t just have to be good, you can’t be up to your waist out of the water, but if you’re sloppy and there’s no composition the scores are lower,” Ira Ter-Ovanesyan said. “So if your presentation is horrible, if you look like a dead fish like our coaches always say, then you’re not doing a good job.”

Cleo Falvey can be contacted at [email protected].