Kyra Hoevertsz & Mikayla Morales  |  Artistic Swimming  |  Aruba

Hailing from the small island country of Aruba off the coast of South America, Kyra Hoevertsz & Mikayla Morales continue to excel as an artistic swimming duet despite only coming together ten months ago.

For Hoevertsz this chapter of her career is what she calls a second chance, an opportunity to fulfil the goals of her younger self that she says she didn’t realise in the first part of her career.

Competing at her first World Aquatics Championships in Barcelona in 2013 at the age of fifteen, Hoevertsz then made appearances in Kazan (2015), Budapest (2017) and Gwangju (2019) before taking a break from the sport after years of extensive travel and limited support.

“I retired from artistic swimming a few years ago and thought I was done,” Hoevertsz told World Aquatics.

“I decided to just do pool swimming and I actually wasn’t that bad at it. I decided to come back as I just didn’t feel like I finished my career the way I wanted to, so now in total it’s been about 17 years in the sport.”

Helping motivate the pair as they break onto the world scene as a duet is the knowledge that comes September, support will come through the World Aquatics Scholarships Programme. In its tenth season of providing support to athletes throughout the world to be afforded the same training and support services as their peers, Hoevertsz and Morales are one of ten artistic swimming duets receiving scholarships for 2023/24.

“Receiving the scholarship is a big accomplishment and I think it will really motivate us and give us the capacity to improve ourselves in the sport as we have really limited space for pools back home,” said Morales.

“And for things like physiotherapy as well, because we actually do not travel with any physiotherapists at the moment so that will be a big help. We are looking forward to going and training somewhere with our coach, and to having new opportunities to get better at the sport.”

Both athletes hail from Aruba’s Barracudas Artistic Swimming Program, a small club of 40 athletes training under the guidance of Coach Ilaria Brandimarte.

With a total country population of just over one hundred thousand, the club is often relying on fundraising drives to enable their swimmers to compete at a higher level, and so the duet’s selection as scholarship athletes comes at a perfect time as they look towards next year’s World Aquatics Championships in Doha and potential qualification for the Paris Olympics.

“For us as a duet, we don’t have any funding back home from anyone or anything, so for us it’s not only going to help with the funding but also the motivation behind it from having a scholarship,” said Hoevertsz.

With competition in Fukuoka now underway, 16-year-old Morales says that competing at her first World Championships is already a dream come true.

“This competition is very exciting as it is my first World Championships so I am very excited about it and looking forward to all the results,” said Morales.

Hoevertsz is competing in the Women Duet Free, Women Duet Technical, Women Solo Free & Women Solo Technical in Fukuoka, while Morales will join her for the Women Duet Free and Women Duet Technical events.

The 'Fukuoka Four' with Kyra & Mikayla

#1 - Swimming Idol

Morales:  All three of the triplets (Anna Maria, Eirini and Vasiliki Alexandri), they have come really far and I’m really excited for them and to see them grow in the sport.

Hoevertsz:  I’ve always looked up to Natalia Ishchenko from Russia growing up.

#2 - Favourite Pool

Morales:  This pool (Fukuoka) is beautiful and well done, and this my first time seeing such a big pool & arena.

Hoevertsz:  The Pan-American games pool in 2019 in Peru, that was such a beautiful pool.

#3 - Pump-Up Song

Morales:  I really like our Free Duet song (Rap God by Eminem). You can get right into it and really impress the judges with your facial expressions and you can be really creative.

Hoevertsz:  It would depend on the event because if it was a solo event I would probably choose something a little more expressive. But for our Free Duet I love our Eminem song as it’s very upbeat.

#4 – Post Competition Plans

Morales:  The plan is to finish our Free Duet and see Japan with some of our days off. It would be really nice to look around as we’ve come far away from home and all the way to Japan. Back home we are preparing for the Pan-American games so I’m really excited for that.

Hoevertsz:  We have three weeks of and then I guess the Pan-American Games is end of the season. And then a recovery break and back to it.

About the World Aquatics Scholarship Programme

Launched in 2014 with the aim of increasing the level of aquatics athletes in countries around the globe, the World Aquatics Scholarship Programme has just announced the scholarship recipient athletes for its tenth season. The main goal of the World Aquatics Scholarships Programme is to identify and create an optimal training environment for athletes aspiring to represent their countries at the next World Aquatics Championships and the Olympic Games. The programme aims to support athletes with greater needs and help them reach their full potential.