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For Release: April 30
World's Elite to Perform Synchronized Swimming Duets, Team Routines at 1998 Goodwill Games
Team Competition Included for First Time in Games' History
Eight of the world's finest duet and team squads will showcase a host of international synchronized swimming talents at the brand new Nassau County Goodwill Games Swimming and Diving Center. Goodwill Games representatives announced today that the synchronized swimming squads of the United States, Canada, China, France, Italy, Japan, Korea and Russia have accepted invitations to compete, July 19-20, in the 1998 Goodwill Games. The announcement came at a press conference held for the dedication of the new multi-million dollar aquatics facility in Nassau County.
Synchronized swimming became a part of the Goodwill Games program in 1990 with the solo and duet disciplines. This year marks the first time in Goodwill Games history that the team competition will be contested.
"The synchronized swimming team competition has been added to our program format because of tremendous demand from the public," said Goodwill Games President Mike Plant. "The U.S. women's perfect 10's in 1996 at the Atlanta Olympics set the stage and brought new levels of interest to the sport. We hope to enhance that this summer. To watch these young athletes perform in perfect unison is breathtaking."
The U.S. has taken the gold in the duet competition in the previous two Goodwill Games (1990, 1994), followed closely by Canada, Japan, Russia and France.
Team and duet competitions will consist of both a short and long program to determine the gold medalist. The gold-medal winning team will earn $10,000. The total prize purse for the duet competition is $6,000, with the gold-medal pair earning $3,000. Second- and third-place finishers in the duet competition will take $2,000 and $1,000, respectively.
COMPETITOR CAPSULES - SYNCHRONIZED SWIMMING
CANADA: Olympic second-place finisher Canada is holding steady with a third-place finish at the World Cup and a respectable fourth-place standing at the World Championships.
CHINA: China caught the attention of the international community after a fourth-place finish in both team and duet at the FINA World Cup in Guangzhou, China, in July. The fourth-place finishes were the highest ever recorded by a Chinese entry in international competition. Prior to the event, China had one fifth-place team finish at the 1991 World Cup in Bonn, Germany, with all remaining results no higher than sixth place.
FRANCE: France's National Team program has also been fortunate to retain seven talented veterans. France finished fifth in the team event at both the 1997 World Cup and the 1998 World Championships.
ITALY: Italy's Giovanna Burlando is one of the world's top soloists, and joins with veterans Giada Ballan and Serena Bianchi to form the core of the Italian National Team. Ballan and Bianchi finished seventh at the World Cup and eighth at the World Championships. However, the team event has proven to be Italy's strength recently, improving from seventh at the World Cup to sixth at the World Championships.
JAPAN: Japan is following closely behind the performances of the Russians during the past two years, claiming silvers in team competition at the World Cup and World Championships. The Japanese duet of Miya Tachibaba and Miho Takeda have been chipping away at the margin of victory between the gold-medal performance of the Russian duo, posting silver-medal performances at the World Cup and World Championships where they narrowed the point spread to a mere 1.0.
KOREA: Korea is the perennial bubble-team due to the youth of its National Team program. Only one athlete is over the age of 20 and only four had National Team experience prior to the 1997 World Cup. Korea finished eighth in team and duet at the World Cup, and eighth in team, ninth in duet at the World Championships.
RUSSIA: Russia is currently the most dominant country in the team event and has proven to be in the best condition. Utilizing six veteran stars, Russia swept the gold medals in team competition at the 1997 FINA World Cup and at the 1998 World Championships. The Russian duo of Olga Brousnikina and Olga Sedakova have also captured gold at both the 1997 and 1998 World Championships.
UNITED STATES: The United States dominated the sport from 1991-1996, including clean sweeps of all the world's major events. However, the retirement of the entire 1996 U.S. Olympic Team has put the United States in a rebuilding phase. Team USA has shown the greatest degree of improvement through the world's two major events of the past year. At the FINA World Cup in July, Team USA placed fifth after qualifying for the final in sixth place. The World Championships saw the team back on the medals stand with a bronze-medal performance. Similarly, in the duet event, the United States' top pair of Carrie Barton and Elicia Marshall placed sixth at the World Cup. After two additional months of training, the pair jumped into fourth place at the World Championships.
The 1998 Goodwill Games are scheduled July 19 - August 2, in Manhattan, Nassau County and on Staten Island. The Games will feature 1,500 international athletes competing in 15 sports for a prize purse of $5 million dollars in world record/performance incentives, the largest prize purse in multi-sport history.
TBS Superstation, the Games' host network, will televise 45 hours of prime-time coverage of the 1998 Goodwill Games. CBS will televise 10 hours of weekend, afternoon coverage. In addition to appearing on TBS and CBS, boxing will be televised on HBO as part of the Boxing After Dark series.
The Goodwill Games are hosted through a combined effort between Goodwill Games, Inc. and the participating sports federations, in conjunction with the appropriate state, city and county governmental agencies. Goodwill Games, Inc., a division of Turner Sports and Time Warner, Inc., is responsible for all aspects of the event.
CONTACTS: Michael Lewellen Goodwill Games/Atlanta 404/827-4786Richard Finn Goodwill Games/New York 212/484-7647Brian Eaton U.S. Synchronized Swimming 317/237-5700