Original subtitles

: Synchro, to most people, is quite easy.

They see the smiles, the makeup,

the hair gel, the flashy suits.

It's kind of a joke to them.

But it's a really hard sport, and really impressive.

It's probably like running an Olympic-level, like,

400-metre sprint

while holding your breath.

It's what the top athletes do,

plus no oxygen.

- ...6, 7,

8, 9.

- 3, 4, 5, 6, 7...

: I had no intention of becoming a synchro swimmer.

I was a gymnast in Calgary for five years.

Obviously, the dream was to be an Olympic gymnast.

That's what I was going for. But, you know,

after face-planting all the time,

I figured it would be a little bit easier if I did it in the water instead.

I didn't really get the full understanding of what synchro really was.

A lot of the work that we do is from other sports.

So we run, we do gym work, weights, ballet, etc., etc.

But we do that as our warm-up to do our own sport.

- It shows like,

if you're below the bottom line,

then you've obviously hit too low.

If you're at the second line and you can maintain it, then it's really good.

And if you're at the top line, well, that's awesome.

: Synchro is a sport that's gonna be mocked no matter what,

because, I mean, we give them the opportunity to do it to us.

If we didn't have the makeup,

if we didn't have the flashy suits,

if we didn't pretend to smile sometimes...

I mean, that happens, of course,

when you're tired, you, like, just put on a face.

And I think if we showed them

what we did on a daily training basis,

or what we do in a training camp

leading up to our base competition,

they would think way differently.

- And 3, up!

And 4! Let's go! Let's go!

: We were starting the routine over and over again

until we had the first thing perfect.

If we didn't have it perfect, the music would stop.

Every time someone made a mistake, music would stop.

That's how crazy it was.

: The stress levels are pretty high.

Uh, I mean, right now, as a team, we understand that,

you know, she's gonna be really intense

and that she's looking for a lot of huge things

coming out of us.

- Tam-tam! Tam-tam! Tam, tam, tam-tam!

Whoo!

Yeah!

- Shotgun!

- Whoo!

- Ah! Ah!

: For sure, Bratislava was a challenge.

I think everybody on the team was really tired.

So, pushing through that,

I think gave us a little bit more confidence

going into Kazan.

This year, it's going to be really important,

because it's our stepping stone to Rio.

We, right now, are in a very difficult position

with the Olympics coming up,

and we need to be in the top 3 at the next qualifier in March.

So we really have to compete well,

and show the judges

that we deserve to either beat Spain

or at least come really close.

: Every competition,

it's always the same rumors about our bodies.

Some of the judges might penalize us

because we're not the same. We're too physically different.

And it's kind of an unwritten law in the sport.

Being synchronized in movement is just not enough.

You have to be similar in the way you look

because it gives that illusion of a type of synchronicity.

For sure, compare it to teams like Russia and China,

we're gonna be different.

Um, in these teams and in these countries,

they select the swimmers from such a young age,

and they're selected on their potential

to achieve a certain body type and a certain size.

And, basically, they look like twins.

That would be the definition of perfection in synchro.

: Us, as Canadians, we are a very diverse country,

and we are a very diverse team.

We really try to blend the team really well

so that we disguise anything that's different.

Like tanning our skin to make sure we're the same skin tone as Marie-Lou,

or if that's, you know,

painting on eyebrows at the right level or the right colour,

so that we can make the same facial expressions.

: There's been a little bit of communication issues,

because it's loud at the pool,

and there's, like, a Chinese coach,

a Russian coach, a Japanese coach, a French coach.

The stress level is, like,

on hyper speed.

Like, we're... bam-bam-bam-bam-bam.

We're trying to do so much stuff in little amounts of time,

because we don't have that much time in the training pool

or in the facility.

: This morning, we were training, and...

Karine dislocated her knee in the run-through.

I had no idea what was going on.

Her body is one of the older ones

and she's been through a lot with this team from like,

past years. But she's a strong woman.

A little bit of tape, a little bit of ice, she'll be fine.

I mean, all of us are pushing through some sort of pain, at this point.

Synchro is really... a tough sport.

Especially because we are...

doing a lot of things underwater at the same time.

We're changing patterns, we're kicking, we're...

You know, there's a lot of body contact.

This sport is almost as contact as football.

- During my career, the injuries that I had

were a broken finger,

a broken nose and a serious concussion.

- I've had three concussions, a black eye, a chipped tooth,

a shoulder dislocation,

hip injury, knee dislocation.

- My, I guess, gluteus maximus muscles...

get really tense and, like, spasm up sometimes,

and I'm limping around for a few days.

- I think I broke my toe.

I'm not a 100 percent. I didn't get an X-ray.

But, like, three years ago, someone smashed really hard onto my toe.

It still hurts to point it, so I'm pretty sure there was something wrong with that.

- Um, I've been pretty lucky.

I've had five sprained ankles, a tendonitis in my left foot,

tendonitis in my right foot,

a pulled hamstring in my right leg,

pulled sartorius in my right leg.

And I think that's about it.

- How'd you get this bucket of ice? Oh, my God.

I think that's enough, thanks!

- Have fun.

- Oh, no!

Ooh!

Okay.

- Nice.

- Yeah. Like Paula said, like,

I was waiting for something more major.

Like, there's little things, but it's still a really solid one for us.

- I love the energy. It was much better.

There's just little things like, we're not initiating at the same time.

- Right.

- But, overall, I thought that the energy was really good.

: Before each competition,

I have a very similar fear with regards to the results.

Synchro is a judged sport,

the artistic notes take a lot of importance,

so there's a lot of subjectivity.

Judges are human, so for sure,

if they don't like a routine, they're going to mark it down.

And it's normal.

I would probably do the same.

But because of that subjectivity,

there is so much politics in this sport,

and the ranking seems to be very similar

from competition to competition.

Other artistic sports, like figure skating and diving,

have really had their revolutions

to find a more objective judging,

but sometimes I feel like we are stuck in a system

that is really detrimental to our own sport.

: I understand why people don't get the makeup part.

But if you think about it, we're in a stadium of, like,

50 000 people

and how are they gonna see our faces

when we're tiny dots in the water.

That's another thing,

people don't really understand how big our competitions can be

and how much we have to portray ourselves in our routine.

: For me, it's just...

we have to keep pushing.

No matter what, she's gonna swim.

She has no choice.

This is world championships.

This is what's gonna lead to the Olympic qualifier.

If she doesn't swim,

we're not gonna go to the Olympic qualifier as winners.

We're not gonna go and be set

for potentially going to the Olympics.

So, in the team's opinion, I think,

she doesn't really have a choice.

: Presenting team number 18 from Canada.

: The last swim was great.

It was good to hear that we had our best swim ever at World's.

I don't think we've ever had an opportunity like that.

Especially with this team, it's so new

that, you know,

it took a really long time for us to come together.

So at this point, it's really great to hear.

The 90 wasn't good enough.

We got beaten by Spain and by Italy,

which should not have happened at all.

We ended up in seventh position.

And that is a really disappointing way to end the summer.

It's something we've been working for

for a really long time,

and to have it taken away at the last second,

it's... not the easiest thing.

: I really wish that we could...

you know...

maybe, I can't say that we could be good enough,

because we are good enough.

It's just... I wish the sport wasn't so political

and that we were...

given the proper chance

to make it to where I think we deserve.

- It's definitely heartbreaking

to think that, you know,

this has been my dream since I was eight

and we might not go.

And if I'm gonna be, like, completely honest,

we probably won't, based on the marks

and what they're giving us at World's, so...

Yeah, it's hard.

: Well, it's been an intense summer.

Starting off with the gold medal at the Pan Am Games in Toronto

in front of a home crowd,

and then to end with such a disappointment in Kazan;

it was really exhausting.

So we'll have some time off to kind of relax

and calm each other down.

This is pretty much my home away from home.

My parents raised me here, pretty much.

We did a lot of skiing, lots of hiking.

So, for me, coming to the mountains is kind of an escape.

World's was a little bit of a negative experience for me.

So people ask me about it here and I'm a little bit negative.

And, you know,

they're trying to pep me up until my next adventure,

so it's good.

- Oh, look at this!

- My God. How did it feel, Claudia?

Like, when you were on the podium

and the Canadian flag rises up. - I started crying.

- Yeah, I watched that.

- I started crying after the swim,

I started crying during the... singing the national anthem.

- We were so proud.

- It was really fun.

It was like, my favorite competition ever.

Probably because, yeah, we won.

- To Claudia! - Thank you.

- This was second in solo prelims.

- Still at UANA, yeah.

- Really tight.

- Look at this. - Yeah, that's tight.

- That... yeah, that was good.

This is the mermaid combo.

- My face is terrible.

It's like the Scream picture that is so famous.

It's terrible.

- This is your little mini scrapbook

of all the people that you wanted to be like.

That's Natalia Ishchenko.

- This was the year I got my concussion,

so it was really important for me to have some sort of guideline.

It's pretty good.

- Yeah.

- We can sit.

- That's perfect.

That routine is so nice.

- We almost have to not be scared to do a few awkward things

to make the good stuff good. Like, they have that weird...

Like when one girl just comes up.

Or like in the figure where they had three in this line

doing this and one girl over here.

And for a second, it's weird, but then it's... You know?

I feel like we would never do that.

- Where we have like, two sets where we're gonna fill in something

and we just fill stuff in for not really a purpose.

And I feel like their routine is really well choreographed that way.

Like, every pattern moves fluidly throughout the routine.

And every figure shows difficulty.

They either show height, they show a spin,

they show something that shows their strength.

- Well, we talked really quick about...

We want the opening to be really interesting.

Like, right away, the judges need to see that we're like,

doing something completely different.

I think we need to dare more.

We watched Japan, China,

like, Japan, especially is freaking weird, but like,

at least they went for it, you know.

They didn't hold back on anything.

- Okay, well, for me, I think, there's, yes,

there's a certain amount that we can all change

and we can all put more effort in, fine.

But we need to figure out how we're gonna use

our, maybe, like, power

and our, you know, look,

which is different than all the top countries,

but how can we use that to our advantage?

- One.

- Ready, go!

- Yeah, you finished after Italy.

- Yeah.

- And it's very difficult to understand why.

In fact, our analysis show that it's impossible.

But we have to play with this judging system.

It's... - Right.

- Ukraine and Spain are far, far, far

from all the other countries in terms of quality.

They did many, many mistakes.

Italy is quite clean.

But we'll see that their choice to...

their strategy to be clean is... - Lower...

- Lower: everything easy.

- You start with like, a heartbeat or whatever,

then there's, whatever, sounds of ambulance.

And then it goes, you know, when the flatline goes, like beep, like that.

The whole routine, basically, you are fighting for your life,

and at the end, you hear the heart again.

- The person's like, about to die. But then like...

- Oh, or she's dead.

- Or she's dead and then she like, comes back to life.

- You know, when like, a person dies,

people say that they see the light or whatever,

like there's an afterlife or something like that?

It's like a dream within a dream, kind of,

that we talked about. Like limbo, yeah.

- So they're all in this world controlled by Big Brother

and they're all--

- It's like the government.

- Big Brother is like, yeah, it's sort of this...

God-like figure,

but it's hardcore communism, basically.

They control your thoughts. They control everything.

: The qualifications are six months away.

And we decided to cut everything out

and start from scratch.

So right now, we're creating a brand-new choreography.

: Oh! - That's so cool.

- Super cool.

: This year, we worked with Xin,

a completely different choreographer

than what we normally work with.

She was amazing.

I don't think any of us really expected

what was going to happen.

And she said, "Okay, I want you to be a tree."

So we all do it and then, we pick it together.

In the end,

the entire routine we created

was based on all the little things that we had done on land, in the water.

And it's all ours.

- I think it's a good idea.

Because acting is all about the focus,

concentration, the presence.

So exercise to make you more present on stage,

to listen to what's happening to your partners.

- Right. - Confidence and trust.

: So we'll begin just by some exercises

for the face, okay?

We'll begin by the eyebrows, frowning.

Relax.

Widen.

Like this.

Relax. Yeah. We look stupid when we do that, you know.

And then, we're gonna expand nostrils. Okay?

Yeah, you're good at that.

: The first time we met Sébastien,

it was a little bit awkward

because I think we're too used to being synchronized swimmers,

so it was weird, it was getting out of the box quite a bit.

- Feel your face.

Okay. Relax.

It's okay.

Move everything.

You are really, really surprised.

: Concentrate on every step you make.

Don't go too fast.

Yeah. You're really concentrate.

Okay, go back to the wall.

So we're gonna do the pride thing again.

So you really want to be there,

but your body is really, really slow.

But you really want to be there. And when you arrive,

you open your arms. Okay?

: Sébastien really taught us

how to do a simple movement with purpose.

So just simply walking with pride.

It's a completely different experience,

it's an emotion from within into a physical movement.

It's not the physical movement with an emotion added on.

: Stay there a little while, breathe in that.

And thank you.

* Happy birthday to you

- Oh, my God.

* Happy birthday to you

* Happy birthday dear Marie-Lou

Happy birthday to you *

- Thank you.

And well, with that, I brought you guys cookies.

- Yeah. - Because it's--

- Yes, it's very sweet.

- So it's for my birthday,

but also because I miss you guys and I know you are working hard.

And, I'm gonna cry, so here, take a cookie.

- Happy birthday, Lou.

- I miss you. I love you. - I love you too.

- Hang in there, I'm coming back soon.

- Okay, that sounds good.

Okay.

- Oh! That's so cool.

- Here's my little surprise.

So it's for the 5 months that we have left,

since it's October. Okay?

So each month, we'll have a countdown

and it's all of the days of the month.

So today is the first.

So Marie-Lou, do you wanna rip one off?

- Ah! - Yeah, do it.

So it'll grow as we rip them off,

the colours will grow for each month.

Until we finish... at the qualifier.

- Bravo!

Really good.

- Bye, guys.

- Happy birthday! We love you!

- What would be your top three things

you'd like to work on until the qualifiers?

- Less stressed.

Does that count

- Yes, if it's about food, it counts.

So less stress about food. - Mm-hmm.

- So what's the stress about food?

- Well...

Like...

I don't want to think about what I'm eating.

- Let's say you buy a croissant. What happens?

- Accept myself.

- Exactly. Eat it, you enjoy, it's once a month and that's it.

- Yeah. - So that's part of life.

- Okay, sounds good.

: Obviously, weight is a big part of our sport.

Having a clear goal in the department

of your body type, body image, is very important for us.

So we get weighed about every three weeks

and do the body-fat testing in the BOD POD.

I mean, it's just about being happy with the way you are

and understanding that what you're doing, weight-wise,

is for the sport, not because you need to look...

skinnier in real life.

I think a lot of us, you know, take it a little bit personally,

and it's hard, especially as a girl;

we're always gonna be struggling with our weight, no matter what.

And I struggled for a very long time,

trying to figure out what it actually meant

to lose weight for my sport,

instead of losing weight because:

"Oh, my God, they think I'm fat."

- Okay, shoulder-width: 43.

- It's been about a year

that I've been diagnosed with an eating disorder.

And, yes, I've been seeing people, experts

and stuff like that. And...

Sorry, I didn't wanna cry.

Sorry, guys, I really did not plan on crying.

It's not supposed to be emotional.

Like, it's not about me, it's just...

synchro is hard for that, and some people get more affected than others.

And for me, it's been going on for a lot of years.

So just make sure that if you need help, go get it right now.

Don't wait a lot of years,

because then it just brings you to bad places.

So that's what I wanted to tell you.

Just... If you need help, go get it now.

Like... yeah.

Have a nice break.

- Ah, I love you.

(counting rhythmically in French)

- Okay, let's try that again.

Okay, what we'll do now

is that we're gonna repeat that section five times. Okay?

And try, each time you do it,

to exaggerate this feeling of strength that you have. Okay?

Yes.

- The choreography you are doing

is a line-up of movements making sense.

Even if you are synchronized, it doesn't mean you're robots.

: Ah!

You are a group of human beings sharing a moment with an audience.

: Ah!

- Make sure the amount of work that we put in every single day,

it's to take... like, it's a stepping stone,

like a little building block on our little Lego house

to eventually going to the Olympics.

So let's keep it up,

don't worry about anything negative today.

We've got it.

- Yeah.

- One, two, three.

Ah-ha! - One month.

- Yay!

: Feel like... really hold every count.

More angry here and especially here, like,

I know we're breathing, but you go, argh.

I'm taking my breath and with a super good highlight.

And that highlight really needs to...

We're missing a bit of power.

But it's the second time we're doing it, so...

Follow through with power. Let's go.

One, two, three. : All in, all out!

- Yeah. - Yes.

Let's do it!

: We've come from a phase

where we needed the time to rebuild everything,

and I think, personally,

it took me a long time to get to that point.

I really needed the time to say, "Okay, what if we don't make it?

What happens then? What am I gonna do with my life?"

And I really needed the time to struggle with that,

and to rebuild my belief in my sport, as well as,

you know, my everyday training.

I go to the pool for seven to 12 hours a day,

and what am I doing it for?

- Okay, and you have like,

before the last look that you did there,

like, something from somewhere else and then you come back.

Okay. Really precise.

Like, I take energy to put it on her. Okay?

- So until two.

Ready?

: You have everything, all the package. Look at those bodies.

Look at those... everything. So just show off.

- I think we can all feel it.

We want this to be a super good one.

It's our last simulation here.

And after that, we get to Brazil and it's like, "Boom, show on!"

One, two, three.

- Good job, good job!

: Honestly, I think we're the underdogs.

I think that people don't expect much of us.

I mean, no one is expecting Canada to change anything,

to be different than what we've been in the past.

You know, you should be a little bit afraid of us.

Like, we're coming from behind and we're gonna get you.

: It's make it or break it right now.

We need to make top three

and it really depends on whether they want us there,

at this point.

We can't control the marks. We can't control the judges.

So as long as we have our best swim,

I think we should be proud.

: We're not perfect, and we might never be

because we're all so different.

And with the way we want to push this sport currently,

we will never be perfect.

But it can be our goal forever,

even if it's absurd, even if it's impossible

because it's been our dream it's been my dream,

since the beginning of our career.

And there's no way we can give up on that.

The last six months, we tried everything.

We did everything to make it possible to achieve perfection.

Maybe we will never see this sport evolve

so that it becomes more objective and more fair.

And maybe we won't even make it to Rio.

But today, the only thing we really can do is

swim together like we've never done it before,

with the hope of being perfect.

Subtitling: CNST, Montreal