Paris Artistic Swimming World Cup: USA and Bill May win team acrobatic bronze

Bill May and USA won team acrobatic bronze at the Paris Artistic Swimming World Cup. GETTY IMAGES

Bill May boosted his chances of becoming the first male artistic swimmer in Olympic history when he and the United States took bronze behind Mexico in the team acrobatic competition at the Paris Artistic Swimming World Cup.

The second stop of the 2024 Artistic Swimming World Cup reached its conclusion on Sunday with the gala in the new Olympic Aquatics Centre in Saint Denis doubling up as a test event for Paris 2024.

The team acrobatic competition went to Mexico who also won Friday’s team technical final. They scored 251.7867 to beat Saturday’s team free winners Japan by just over three and a quarter points.

The United States, with May the only male swimmer in the competition, took third place with 243.9366 ahead of China.

Bill May and the United States won team acrobatic bronze at the Artistic Swimming World Cup in Paris. GETTY IMAGES
Bill May and the United States won team acrobatic bronze at the Artistic Swimming World Cup in Paris. GETTY IMAGES

May told World Aquatics afterwards, “We’ve modified our routines and we’ve made a lot of changes so we’re in the middle of the final product, so to see we’d made a medal was incredible. We’ve been working really hard, but we’re only a small percentage of what you’re going to see at the Olympics.”

On 7 June, the 45-year-old will find out whether he will be part of the squad for Paris after men were deemed eligible for the team event in December 2022. USA were seventh in the team technical and sixth in the team free.

In the other Olympic disciplines, Britain’s world silver medallists Kate Shortman and Isabelle Thorpe won the women’s duet technical on Friday, beating Moe Higa and Mashiro Yasunaga of Japan into second place. Audrey Lamothe and Jacqueline Simoneau of Canada took the last spot on the podium.

On Saturday morning, Austrian twins Anna-Maria and Eirini-Marina Alexandri were runaway winners of the women’s duet free. The Greek-born pair won Austria’s first global artistic swimming title at Fukuoka 2023 but had not competed since due to Anna-Maria suffering a dislocated shoulder.

In their return to action, the Alexandris were over 20 points clear of Ukrainian twins Maryna and Vladyslava Aleksiiva who had just missed out on the technical podium. Lamothe and Simoneau won their second bronze medal in two days with Shortman and Thorpe opting to rest.

This was the first official competition in the new Olympic Aquatics Centre which was hailed a “huge success” by athletes and officials alike.

French Federation of Swimming chief executive Laurent Ciubini said, “The experience was enchanting for us in a wonderful venue. Everyone tells us they are happy, so we are quite delighted by this experience.”

The Olympic Aquatics Centre will stage artistic swimming, diving and water polo preliminary matches at Paris 2024.



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