As Team GB’s chef de mission Mark England puts it: “They are pioneers.”
The British duo won silver and bronze medals at the 2024 World Championships
Despite Team GB’s poor history in the Olympic discipline, Shortman and Thorpe’s medal-winning performance at the World Championships in January woke the world to their potential.
The pair met at school in Bristol and have been swimming together since. Both born in 2001, they have previously said how much they feel like sisters.
With their similar blonde hair, matching Olympic tattoos and telepathic-like performances, you can see why.
“We finish each other’s sentences, wear the same clothes, put our hair the same,” said Thorpe.
Artistic swimming is judged upon execution, artistic impression and precision. What is often made to appear as effortless can require the most gruelling of training regimes consisting of yoga, weights, swimming, dance and apnea training, which is commonly used by freedivers.
As a result, Shortman and Thorpe can both hold their breath underwater for three minutes - a skill talent when you realise just how little opportunity there is to come up for air during a routine.
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The Olympic artistic swimming scene has long been dominated by teams from the ’s Republic of China, Russia, the USA and Japan.
As a result, artistic swimmers in Great Britain have often lacked funding and the extra support needed for an Olympic Games campaign.
Nevertheless, Shortman and Thorpe’s spark for the sport has never gone out.
“I’ve always seen the potential,” said Izzy’s mum Karen, who is also a former artistic swimmer and now the manager of the sport at UK Aquatics.
