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Dynamo Water Polo Club returned home from the
11th FINA Masters Water Polo World Championships at Stanford University in Palo Alto,
CA last week with plenty of positive results. Unfortunately, their 0-5 record was not
in the “plus” column.
“It’d be great if we went undefeated and won the tournament.” explains driver Manny
Torres. “However, we knew that was unrealistic before we boarded the airplane two weeks
ago. We played five games against five better teams, so the 0-5 record isn’t a surprise,”
continued Torres, who swam and played water polo at N.C. State University.
“Our goals for the FINA trip were to play hard, represent our club well and meet players
from around the world,” added Stuart Sheldon, a utility player who swam and played polo at
Washington & Lee University and served as club manager for the trip. “Based on the number of
t-shirts we traded, PowerBars we shared during the games and beers consumed at the Gordon
Biersch tent we definitely accomplished at least two of our goals. We never gave up in the
pool so I rate the trip a complete success.”
“At the end of the first quarter of our first game we trailed Swim Club Neustadt (Germany)
team by four,” reflected team veteran and Villanova water polo alum Ed Opalach. “It was
definitely a rude awakening. The troops rallied a bit when I reminded them that those guys
put their lederhosen on one leg at a time, just like us.”
The only real competitive disappointment for Dynamo came against the Sharks, from southern
California. Scouting earlier games, DWPC felt they matched up best against this opponent.
Consistently poor execution and mistakes by Dynamo throughout the game kept the Sharks on
the feeding end of the meal. DWPC took some consolation from the fact that three of their
five opponents finished in the top 5 of the entire tournament.
Over 7,200 athletes from 75 countries competed in five aquatic disciplines - Water
Polo, Synchronized Swimming, Open Water Swimming, Diving and Swimming at the bi-annual event.
(
Full tournament results)
- S.C. Neustadt (GER) 11 - Dynamo 4
- Bay Area (USA) 10 - Dynamo 6
- W.P. Romania 16 - Dynamo 2
- Sharks (USA) 11 - Dynamo 1
- Newport WPF (USA) 13 - Dynamo 3
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Latest Headlines:
5/21/08 - Dynamo drops 4, wins 1 at Tampa Thunder Invitational. 
Thundered in Tampa
5/20/08 - Dynamo Water Polo officially embraces the Masters Water Polo concept and the age brackets that come along with it.
4/13/08 - Dynamo runs through their bracket with wins over Washington, Charlotte and FSU, only to lose by one in the tournament final, 6-5, to Illinois at the 2008 Dogwood Invitational.
4/6/08 - The tournament's two best teams ended up in the same bracket and Florida International got the best of Dynamo in what the tournament referees called "...the best game of the weekend."
2/17/08 - The Dynamo Water Polo Club retained PowerBar as its primary sponsor for 2008 & 2009. The club started its relationship with PowerBar in 1992, so 2008 marks the 16th year of the mutually beneficial combination. Over the newly inked two year committment, Dynamo will receive support in the form of PowerBar products, hats, shirts, banners, etc, plus the opportunity to generate extra club revenue when Dynamo helps to get the PowerBar name in front of others through media, online and athlete exposure. Dynamo proudly looks forward to hosting the 10th Annual PowerBar Cup August 23rd and 24th at the Chamblee, Georgia home of the Dynamo Swim Club.
Past headlines...
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