Nationals are coming up for the cheerleaders here at Greenwood High School. A lot of the girls here compete with Cheerville Athletics for all-Star and on the Greenwood cheer team. I had the pleasure of interviewing Knox Volkert, Meredith Ragan, and Sophia Gragg over their sport.
High school cheer nationals are coming up in February on the 8-15th. Greenwood will be going to Disney World to compete against other high schools from all over the nation. Recently, the girls competed in regions and did well enough to qualify for nationals. They practice most days after school to get their routines perfect. Knox Volkert, a sophomore at GHS says that she is skeptical of how they will do, but “If everyone works together we will have a better chance.”
Nationals for all-star (Cheerville) are also at Disney World on April 30th- May 9th. One team at Cheerville, The Bombshells, compete in many competitions on the weekends and travel often. The girls say they love traveling everywhere to compete. Sophia Gragg, a member of the Bombshell team at Cheerville, says,” If we want to win, everyone needs to have a good attitude and open to trying new things.” Winning comps gets them “bids” to be able to go to nationals. A bid is basically an invitation that teams get when they do good in order to be able to go to nationals. In order to be successful in competitions, they have to practice all the time and be really talented. They practice every Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday, and some Fridays. All the girls are really confident in their team’s ability to succeed and “hit” both days which means getting no points off of their routine. They are pretty confident in also making it to finals.
Overall, Meredith, Sophia, and Knox all say that they love both teams but they enjoy Cheerville more. Meredith Ragan says she enjoys “the thrill and adrenaline” of doing complex stunts and “the rush after we compete is exhilarating.” All-star cheer is way more competitive and challenging for the girls, which makes it more fun for them, whereas Greenwood is “less competitive and a more fun environment.” says, Meredith Ragan. The Greenwood girls competed in Nationals this past week. They finished 5th place in the US for medium non- tumble gameday division. Nevertheless, Greenwood cheer made history this year placing higher than ever in history, which is a HUGE accomplishment for these girls!