ALVAREZ Anita

General
LOSS OF CONSCIOUSNESS
She briefly lost consciousness near the end of her preliminary duet free routine with partner Lindi Schroeder at an Olympic qualification competition in Barcelona, Spain, in June 2021. Coach Andrea Fuentes dove in fully clothed to assist her. "I honestly thought I was asleep. I started hearing people saying, 'It's going to be OK.' I thought, 'Stop telling me that. I'm trying to sleep.' Then I realised that no, I was still in the pool." She was medically cleared to continue competing, and performed with Schroeder in the technical routine later that day. Alternate Ruby Remati replaced her in the free final, where the US duet earned a berth to the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo. She says her episode in Barcelona was not the first time she has passed out during a routine. "It's happened before in training. You have long training days and they're very intense. We're doing some extra endurance training where I push my body to the max, which is understandable. This was different. I actually didn't feel it until the very end. I felt more tired than usual, but I didn't think I was going to pass out. On that last arm [position], I'm like 45 degrees horizontal when I'm supposed to be vertical. I remember doing it and thinking I was vertical. Then the feeling kept spinning, like I was in a hamster wheel. I don't remember anything until I got to the wall. They had already carried me to the wall and I kind of woke up out of it and realised my coach was in the pool." (olympics.nbcsports.com, 13 Jun 2021; wivb.com, 25 Jun 2021)