Champion Cheer

Teamwork, dedication, and passion. These three things are the key strengths to being a competitive cheerleader at Champion All Stars, out of Castalia. Several Bellevue students are apart of the Champion All Stars family including 2018 grad Tessa Buchanan, juniors Savannah Fazio and Payten Manlet, freshman Kaitlyn Baum, 8th graders Hope Alda, Emma Eberle, Callie Fazio, 7th grader Carissa Snezek, 6th grader Amaya Manlet, 5th grader Reese Fazio and 3rd grader Baya Kile. These cheerleaders help make up three out of the five teams at Champion; SMOEX, JunioRX, and Mini ChiX.

Both senior and junior teams at Champion Cheer Central competition in Toledo.

Champion attends 10 regular competitions throughout the year, with three being out of state. To prepare for these competitions, they practice three times a week for an hour and a half to two hours long. The day of a competition the teams meet in a room to stretch, run through their routine, and get ready for warm-ups. After that, they move to warm-ups where they warm up jumps, tumbling, and stunts, along with doing a stunt out where they do their routine with just stunts. An all-star routine lasts two minutes and thirty seconds long and throughout the routine, they perform jumps, tumbling, stunts, and dancing. When performing, four judges watch with watching a specific part of the routine to judge. In the end, the team gets an overall score based on how well they performed.

Recently, the senior team, SMOEX, received a paid bid to D2 Summit. Summit is a huge competition held in Florida for all-star teams, levels one through four, around the world. The team earned their bid to Summit by attending the COA two day cheer competition and hit zero, meaning they had zero deductions from their routine, both days. Being able to attend Summit is a goal that every all-star cheer team wants to accomplish.

As said before, teamwork is a key strength to have being a competitive cheerleader. Win or lose, you always have your team to fall back on. Savannah Fazio commented, “Being on Champion is like having a second family. We’re all really close and we can count on one another to pick us up if we are down.” These athletes are building friendships and memories that will last a lifetime with each practice and competition making them stronger than the last.

By: Mackenzie Miller

Photos courtesy of Tessa Buchanan, BHS Class of 2018