PAOLA TIRADOS SÁNCHEZ
  
Paola Tirados was born in Las Palmas Gran Canaria (Spain). She was enrolled by her parents in swimming lessons at the age of three. Paola loved the water and her swimming lessons so much that when she turned five her mother encouraged her to join the synchronized swimming team in Las Palmas, a sport that at the time was not as well-known as it is today. Right away it caught Paola’s attention and she took to it naturally.

EARLY YEARS

Every day after school Paola would go to her synchronized swimming lessons and little by little, she learned how to move as naturally and gracefully as any fish in the water. She took part in her first competition at eight years of age at the National Championships of Spain and won her first gold medals at a national level by the age of ten in the four primary events: Figures, Solo, Duet and Team. Paola became the youngest swimmer to have achieved such excellence at the time. 

Her dream was to become a part of Spain’s National Synchronized Swim Team. This opportunity came sooner than she expected and by thirteen, Paola was competing with Spain’s selected swimmers in every international synchronized swimming event. She went on to win the gold in the figures and solo competition and in the most important international swimming competition of it’s time, the COMEN (the Mediterranean Synchronized Swimming Cup). Later, Paola won the bronze for the solo competition in the Junior European Championship.

ATHLETIC CAREER

From that moment onward, Paola’s hours of training for competition increased as her determination to compete and win did. She had joined Spain’s “Dream Team.” Spain’s team had gone from being virtually unrecognized to becoming an international sensation of the synchronized swimming world. 

Paola was one of the top swimmers at international level, and historically the best swimmer to have come out of the Canary Islands. She made history when she and her doubles partner Gemma Mengual, along with the entire team, won the first European, World and Olympic medals in this sport for Spain.

ACOMPLISHMENTS

Paola has 24 years of experience as a swimmer, competing globally. She has won a combined 38 medals between the European and World Championships and Cups. She has also participated in 3 Olympic Games, wining a Silver Olympic medal in 2008:

• Sydney 2000: 1 Olympic Diploma, 7th place in Duet.
• Athens 2004: 2 Olympic Diploma, 4th place in Duet and 4th place in Team.
• Beijing 2008, Olympic Silver Medal, in Team.

EXPERIENCE OUT OF THE WATER

Even when Paola was training, she would always have time to teach younger girls. She loves sharing and passing on all she has learned as a swimmer to others, including the core values and philosophy of synchronized swimming.
She has worked with children of all ages, teaching swimming and dancing in the water. She has conducted camps in different parts of Spain including Barcelona, Galicia, Ibiza, Seville and the Canary Islands as well as in Costa Rica, Panama, Chile and USA. Paola also guest-coached the American Synchronized Swimming National Team for Olympics of London 2012.
She has been bestowed the title of Swimming Instructor by the Royal Spanish Swimming Federation and for several years taught at the University of Barcelona, organized exhibition events at sea, for the government of her native city Las Palmas of Gran Canaria, and she was member of the Spanish Olympic Committee from 2004 to 2012.

Paola finished her studies of Architecture in Barcelona, in 2011, and she has worked in the world of interior design. 
In 2012 she moved to USA in search of her dream. At the moment, Paola combines her passion for synchronized swimming, teaching with Imagine Swimming at New York City as Talent Coach with US Synchro while also working on her new sports brand, SINCHRO by Paola Tirados.