Region Drill Competition 2010

On Thursday, January 21, was the annual Region 8 Drill Team Competition. It was my first Region with my new team. Every team in the Region had something new they were dealing with: Maple Mountain - new school; Payson - new coach; Salem Hills - new coach and they are 4A, last year they were 3A; Spanish Fork - was 5A, now 4A; Springville - new coach, and Uintah - was 3A, now 4A. Needless to say, we were all in some sort of "new" situation.

For me, I had been in an "easier" region for the past two years. We only had 4 competing drill teams, so everyone got to go to State. This new region had 6 competing drill teams and only the top 4 get to go to State. Every team was pretty good and we were all very competitive, so it would be a good competition!

The day began with practice and then I got the rest of the day to prepare for the event. Maple Mountain was the host school for Region.

Our team had their practice time at 1:30 p.m. and then we took the girls down to an empty classroom where they watched "Forever Strong". The officers made smoothies for all of the team and brought pop corn, etc. We wanted to stay at the school until the competition began, so we thought watching the movie would help everyone relax a bit and also get pumped up!

After the movie, we went to the cafeteria for our team dinner. The moms had decorated the tables so cute and we had some yummy sandwiches, salad, and treats!

The team and moms presented Marci and I with a corsage and a cool Maple Mountain necklace. Here we are with our gifts:

The team, excited for dinner:
Sharing a moment with Salem Hill's drill team:

The team received cute crocheted head wraps from the moms and Marci made them all a big cupcake with a trophy on it that said "Dream Big". The cupcakes were so yummy! They were filled with cream cheese and frosted with cream cheese frosting! So good!

After dinner, we went to our locker room to prepare for the competition. Here's the team praying before they performed their military routine:

Getting ready to perform!

Before the awards were read, they announced the All-Region Drill Team members. Each team selects 3 members to the All-Region Team. I took this picture of the team members from Maple Mountain, Payson, and Salem Hills. I coached all nine of those girls! The Salem Hills and Payson girls when I was at Payson last year and the year before; and the Maple Mountain girls this year!

Well, when the awards were read--we were very excited! 1st place in Military; 1st place in Dance, and 1st place in Kick--REGION CHAMPIONS!

It was such a great night! I'm so very proud of this team--they are so talented and have worked so hard. Everything was so worth it!

We also had two girls place in the drill down. Halie Bingham, our drill team President, won 4th place in the drill down and Alexus Poulsen won 3rd place in the drill down. Way to go Elleves!