American swimmer Anita Alvarez rescued by her coach after fainting and sinking at the World Aquatics Championships
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ByEurosport
Updated 23/06/2022 at 09:19 GMT
American swimmer Anita Alvarez had to be rescued by her Spanish coach after fainting and sinking to the bottom of the pool at the World Aquatic Championships in Budapest, Hungary. It is not the first time Alvarez has fainted in the pool. Fuentes had to jump into the pool to make a rescue at an Olympic qualifier in Spain last year.
Anita Alvarez
Image credit: Getty Images
Artistic swimmer Anita Alvarez had to be rescued from the bottom of the pool by her coach after fainting and sinking at the World Aquatic Championships.
The 25-year-old sunk after completing her routine in the solo free final in Budapest. She was pulled out by her coach Andrea Fuentes before being taken away on a stretcher.
Fuentes - a four-time Olympic medallist in her own right - later said: "Anita is okay - the doctors checked all vitals and everything is normal - [her] heart rate, oxygen, sugar levels, blood pressure, etc… all is OK.
"We sometimes forget that this happens in other high-endurance sports [such as] marathons, cycling, cross country. We all have seen images where some athletes don't make it to the finish line and others help them to get there.
"Our sport is no different than others, just in a pool, we push through limits and sometimes we find them.
"Anita feels good now and the doctors also say she is okay. Tomorrow she will rest all day and will decide with the doctor if she can swim the free team finals or not."
Alvarez scored 87.6333 points for her routine which saw her place seventh in the final.
Fuentes told Marca that she jumped in to Alvarez's rescue "because the lifeguards weren't doing it".
"It felt like a whole hour," she said. "I said things weren't right, I was shouting at the lifeguards to get into the water, but they didn't catch what I said or they didn't understand.
"She wasn't breathing. I went as quickly as I could, as if it were an Olympic final."
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