Delaware Olympic silver medalist swimmer returns preps for college career

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Megumi Field had a pretty incredible last summer before college. The 18-year-old Wilmington, Delaware native visited Paris, met some celebrities and people from around the world and even went viral on social media. But the real emotional highlight was winning an Olympic silver medal as part of the U.S. artistic swimming — also called synchronized swimming, or synchro — team, the program’s first podium since 2004.

“We were on the podium and I was looking to my left and my teammate was crying,” Field remembered. “I was like, ‘Okay, well I have to look [to my right],’ and she was crying, and I was like, ‘Ah, I don’t know where to look. Everyone’s crying. I’m gonna start crying.’”

This fall, Field starts her freshman year at Stanford University, where she’ll have to balance her studies with competing in a storied artistic swimming program, all while keeping half an eye on the 2028 games in Los Angeles.

Staying in a ‘bubble’

The U.S. artistic swimming team last competed in the Olympics in 2008. The team clinched Olympic qualification through a third place finish during its free routine at February’s World Aquatics Championships in Doha.

Field, one of two Delawareans who competed in the games, began her artistic swimming journey at age 5, inspired by her mother’s love of the sport and her affection for the water. She made her first national team at 10, and then shortly after moved to Los Angeles with her mom to get more opportunities and better coaching.

Before going into the water, the team held hands together in a circle, then put their hands in the middle and chanted in unison, “Hold in sharp and clean and crisp, and long and tight. Commit. Convective patterns. Three, two, one, team.”

“It’s so long but it just summarizes everything … our focus points have been for the last few months,” Field said.