Best known for their cheers on Friday nights, WCHS varsity cheer also competes in multiple competitions when they are not cheering on the sidelines. Competition season consists of multiple early Saturday mornings during the fall season.

Their first competition was invitationals at Whitman High School. Going into the competition, the girls did not know how they were going to end up performing, since it was their first time competing as a new team. This competition was just to prepare them for future competitions, so they were just hoping to have fun. Most of the team has their full squad tucks, putting their tumbling above other teams in the county. During their performance, they were able to hit all their stunts and tumbling, all the pyramids stayed up and they finished with no deductions. They ended up getting third place out of 12 teams in the county.

“We got to show off our skills to other teams in the county without any pressure,” sophomore Chloe Goldberg said.

The team has been practicing for two hours four times a week to prepare for counties. At practice, they go through all the stunts and their full routine in order to make sure timing and synchronization is perfect.

“The practices the week of counties are always very stressful and we do a lot of full routines which is really tiring,” Goldberg said.

The week leading up to counties, the team had spirit week in order to increase enthusiasm prior to the competition.

“For spirit week we had to plan the different themes to do each day and it made the team more excited for the competition,” senior and captain Danielle Menkart said.

The team met for brunch Oct. 27 and then got ready for the competition together.

“It was so fun to bond with my friends by doing each other’s hair and makeup and getting hyped for the competition,” Goldberg said.

For counties, the team was able to warm up in the hallways at Blair High School, where the competition was taking place, while other teams were performing. They always have a huddle before they walk onto the mat just to get each other ready to do their best.

They started the routine with full squad roundoff tucks, and then went into standing tumbling. Then the flyers did a basket toss with their bases throwing them in the air. Their main stunt consisted of five flyers and five stunts groups. A few people do running tumbling, the last one to tumble always has the most difficult, the full. The bracers hold the middle flyer as she flips, which is very important because without the bracers, the stunt is illegal. They finished off with a dance. The team placed second with no deductions, missing first place by just a point.

Their main goal of counties was to beat Sherwood High School and make it to regionals. Unfortunately, Sherwood placed first. But, WCHS cheer made it to regionals and has another chance to beat Sherwood and possibly make it to states. Currently they are placed 7th out of 102 teams in the state.

“Semifinals was exciting because it was all of the top teams in the region competing against each other,” Menkart said.

The girls competed in state semifinals Nov. 3 at Harford Community College and ended up placing 11th in their region. For the first time, WCHS cheer will be advancing to states Nov, 10. The team is one of three other teams in the county that advanced to states.

“This is the first time Churchill has made it to states so it is exciting and we are unsure as to what to expect,” Menkart said.