Anita Alvarez, congratulations on competing at your third Olympics. There seems to be a real emergence of the Pan-American nations at present with the United States, Mexico and Canada all qualifying for the Team event in Paris. The Pan-American nations seem to be having a moment right now in Artistic Swimming?

I think it's been really cool to see, especially this past year. Going into the Pan-American Games, that was our first chance to qualify for Paris, and I think in my head for a long time that was like our only chance to qualify. I thought this is our best chance, and if we don't get it here, we're not going to make it later. In my head there was only one Pan-American country that was going to qualify.

So of course, Pan-Ams was devastating. We got silver and just missed out on qualifying, but in the end, it worked out well for us. We had a great run in Doha where we got to qualify through that World Championships, and at the same time, Canada also qualified. It was really cool to see that it doesn't need to be just one Pan-American country. To see the growth in the Americas, and how now all three of us are fighting for top ranks in the Olympics, it has opened my eyes that it is possible for all of us to be here at the Olympics.

Daniella Ramirez, with the growing use of social media, it has given athletes from non-mainstream sports the opportunity to connect with fans and to grow their sports. As an athlete with a large online presence, do you feel a responsibility to use your profile and platform to help grow Artistic Swimming in the United States?

To be honest, I posted something on Tiktok about us taking down our hair, which I thought was just interesting, and people were just very confused when they saw it! I think that’s why it got a lot of engagement! But I realised that it was more of an opportunity to grow my sport, because there is not a lot of regular opportunities for us to do it. Our sport is very niche, it’s not super big, so I thought ‘why not’.

And I kept posting, and there is a lot of swimmers that have got a lot of inspiration from me and I am very honoured to be put in this position where I can grow my sport. I just want to keep going, thinking of people like llona (Maher) who just won her first medal, and is really blowing up on Instagram and Tiktok. She is really growing the sport of Rugby and I really want to do that for Artistic Swimming. She’s a big inspiration for me, and I hope to be like that for other people.

Jaime Czarkowski, what would be more satisfying, winning a gold medal here in Paris, or that feeling when the Boston Celtics won the NBA Championships at the start of the year?

Look that’s a great question! I have to be honest, when the Celtics won the championship, it was a pretty surreal feeling! But the first thing I said when that happened was, watching their emotions, it took me back to when we qualified at Doha. Seeing that they couldn’t put words to what they had just accomplished. And so I think watching them do that was really special for me because I experienced that feeling in Doha. Getting to qualify with everyone was a super special feeling.

It also got me super excited with the Olympics coming up, of what we can accomplish, and reminding myself of that feeling has been a big motivation. But of course, winning a gold medal would be incredible.

Anita Alvarez, Daniella Ramirez & Jaime Czarkowski are competing for the United States of America in the Acrobatic Routine (5 Aug), Free Routine (6 Aug), and Technical Routine (7 Aug), as part of the Artistic Swimming Mixed Team event. Jaime Czarkowski is also competing in the Free Routine (9 Aug), and Technical Routine (10 Aug), as part of the Women’s Duet event alongside Megumi Field.