At the beginning of this summer, Colorado Springs saw 4 club teams in the area consolidate into a large new club team. Cheyenne Mountain Aquatics (CMA), Colorado Springs Swim Team (CSST), Altitude Performance Swim Team (ALPS), and Woodmoor Waves (WOOD) have now merged into a team called Colorado Springs Area Swimming (COSA). COSA currently has approximately 500 swimmers on its roster, making it one of the largest clubs in Colorado.
COSA CEO and investor Cheryl Bisque describes the merger as a natural move, saying “COSA Swimming is the result of a common vision and efforts by the Head Coaches of our four merging teams.” She goes on to add that with COSA’s size, they will be able to provide “top-notch instruction for all levels of swimmers, from new bubble blowers to world champions.”
One of the former clubs that now make up COSA, Woodmoor Waves, was experiencing growth on their roster, but was having issues procuring enough pool space for practices. When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the 4 clubs worked closely together in order to share pool space and time. They also came together to host quad meets, in order to adhere to the COVID protocols issued by the state and local governments. With the teams working together to share pool time, and competing against each other in meets, the beginnings of the merger were beginning to take place.
At beginning of June, COSA issued a press release announcing the official merger of the 4 teams. Their first summer was a successful one. It began with COSA sending a swimmer to Wave I of the Olympic Trials. Caroline Bricker competed in the women’s 100 breast in Omaha. Bricker went on to win women’s individual high point at the Austin Sectionals meet in July, then traveled to Irvine for the Western Speedo Summer Championships, where she recorded 3 A finals appearances. As a team, COSA finished 2nd at the Colorado 13 & over state meet this summer, and posted a top 20 finish at Western Senior Zones.
In addition to the swim team’s successful first few months, COSA has big plans. They’re currently in the process of building a new aquatics facility in Colorado Springs. Bisque is the investor on this project, and has put money down on the 2012 Olympic Trials warmup/warm down pool, has an agreement on a plot of land, and is working with an architect. The plan currently is to use the 2012 Trials pool as an 8-lane 50m pool, that can also be configured into a 20-lane 25 yard pool. COSA also intends to have a variety of support facilities, including dryland areas for the swimmers, as well as spectator seating and a swim shop. Additionally, they plan to make the facility workable for high-altitude training camps.
This concept is ridiculous. Sounds like a bunch of subpar coaches trying to combine forces to become extra-subpar. Falco is trash, Stromberg is trash, Schumm is a great guy but not sure as a coach, Woodmoor’s coach is irrelevant. Caroline Bricker will carry this team, and the millionaire’s pool won’t even be built by the time she’s off to college. Good luck all, y’all will need it.
Pretty harsh words from swimfan69! Two of the coaches are trash, one is a good guy and the forth in command is irrelevant? Who are you recruiting for?? Caroline Bricker isn’t the only swimmer produced by these four teams. One of the teams had two former swimmers in the 2021 USA Olympic Trials. The same team had another former swimmer represent Canada in Tokyo.
Swimfan89-your comments about the new COLORDO SPRINGS AREA SWIMMING brought tears to my eyes and made it hard to sleep soooo I reply. Your words are too strong in commenting about 4 teams combining to be a better team as some USAS teams have as many as 1,500+ swimmers. These coaches are not “TRASH”. They are good people doing the best they can for a sport they love and helping kids learn how and experience “being the best they can be” Not everyone can or wants to be an Olympian.
Coach Stromberg is NOT trash. He has coached age group and NCAA top D2 university teams for 48 years. He wrote the county COVID variance which was approved so… Read more »
I’ll summarize..swimfan69…you are a JERK!
It is always good to have more pools in our region to grow the sport. “Super” team is a stretch. Some minor summer league teams joining some better teams as CSST and Cheyenne Mountain Aquatics is good and maybe they will be more competitive. But team size does NOT make a Competitive team. It just means more swimmers. I have been involved with Club Swimming for over 20 years and have raised 6 swimmers. So far 5 have made it to the Collegiate level. I have seen the effects of good and bad coaching and can say that after this long Pike’s Peak Athletics would be the Number 1 choice for “Competitive” Swimming in the Colorado Springs area. They have… Read more »
Sounds like you are ‘recruiting’ for PPA. You have an obvious bias and agenda…
Know you are from Wisconsin when you scan through the headlines and read this as “new Colorado Springs supper club”… and want to read more
Consolidation is inevitable and is necessary to save the sport given the financial uncertainty of smaller clubs. Kudos to innovative thinking. We need more of this.
Is it the 2012 or 2021 Warm up pool? Is it 8 lane or 10 lane pool as the competition pool was a 10 lane pool.
It is the warm-up pool. The competition pool was repurposed into a 10-lane, 35-yard pool just outside of Boston.
It’s surprising to me that 9 years later the 2012 pool would still even be available. I wonder where it’s been all this time…
I’m curious as to why the 2012 warmup pool wasn’t the 2016 warmup pool.
The answers you seek lie within the failed complex in papillon, Nebraska area.
2012, which was an 8 lane warmup pool.
Did usa swimming ever announced a public bid for this pool? Many usa swimming programs would have liked the opportunity to bid on it if it was out there..
I don’t know the exact background on it, but I believe another club in Nebraska bought it, and at that point it belonged to that club or their creditors – not USA Swimming anymore.
Legitimate question on my part that I don’t have an opinion on–are these “super clubs” good for USA Swimming? Should the LSC be doing more to provide financial support to start-ups and smaller clubs as to not discourage the entry of new teams?
No, they’re really not good for anything except boosting their Club Excellence rankings.
Dude just let us have our team we decided it was a good idea.
Not even sure why we even have individual teams at this point. Let’s just all compete as 1 team so we can all say we’re winners!
Pikes Peak is the better option.
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Pikes Peak is currently open for drop in lap swim, $15.00. They just did annual maintenance and the pool is crystal clear!