“My name is Laia Coma and I am originally from Barcelona, Spain but am now living in Miami, Florida. I work with all swimmers here at College Sports America and help them with the process of obtaining a sports scholarship in the US! My passion for swimming began at age 2 when I started taking swimming lessons in my home town pool. A few years later, I started to swim for my hometown club team which is where my swimming career really began, qualifying for Spanish Nationals and for other important swimming meets. This was also the time when I started getting more and more interested in college swimming and when I decided that I wanted to move over to the US to take my swimming to the next level. The reason why I decided to go to America to study and swim was because of how difficult it was for me at home to keep studying and at the same time follow my passion as a swimmer and keep training every day. The opportunity that I was given to come to America was a once in a lifetime chance that I could not have rejected. Therefore, my student-athlete career started in the summer of 2015, when I decided to commit to Limestone College in South Carolina on a swimming scholarship. I swam there for one year and after that I transferred to Lynn University, in Boca Raton, Florida. The facilities and advantages that a student-athlete has here are truly amazing. I got to live on campus, with the pool and all my classes within walking distance. We had an athletic trainer that was taking care of us, a specific coach for the gym sessions, a sports psychologist, and we were provided with all the swimming equipment that we needed. Apart from that, I got to meet incredible people and lifelong friends from all over the world. More than half of the team was international, so the amount of different cultures within the team was incredible and I got to learn new things almost every day. And of course, swimming and training under the sunshine of South Florida every day was an amazing experience. And in terms of academics, as soon as I arrived on campus I was assigned an academic advisor who helped me schedule my classes according to my swimming schedule, so that I had help in every aspect and whenever I needed it. I graduated with a major in Sports Management and a minor in Marketing while competing in college swimming for all 4 years. I qualified for the Conference Championship in the 100 and 200 backstroke all four years and I got to qualify for the NCAA DII Nationals in 2019. I can only say that my four year experience in America as a student-athlete on a swimming scholarship was absolutely incredible and my best adventure so far.” – Laia Coma, College Sports America Swimming