Congratulation to the FHS Junior Varsity Cheerleading Competition team! They
competed this past Saturday at Six Flags Over Georgia™s 11th Annual
Cheer-Fest in Atlanta. There were teams from all over the south competing
including Georgia, Kentucky, Florida, Alabama, Tennessee and South Carolina.
The FHS team brought home four trophies in their division: 2nd place
overall, 1st place in stunting, 2nd place in choreography, and 3rd place in
showmanship. Due to a time mix up by Six Flags on when their division
started the 12 member team barely had enough time to go over parts of their
routine one time to counts before preforming. The other teams all had a 30
minute warm-up/practice time with their music.
The JV team has been together since last June, practicing two to three times
a week in addition to their game schedule for football and basketball once
the seasons started. They originally had thirteen members but three were
moved to the varsity team in October causing the JV team to literally start
over. In January they made the decision to compete at the Pepsi-Cola
Cheerleading Championship at Erwin High School on February 12th. This meant
extra practice aside from regular practice and game schedules, which always
come first with the FHS cheerleading program.
After leaning a routine and practicing endlessly for 5 weeks (four members
of the team were also practicing with the varsity team at the same time for
the NC state competition) the team came through with an almost flawless
routine at Erwin. They placed 3rd in their division which was great but they
were not satisfied and felt they could have placed higher away from the local
area. So they made the decision to continue with a competition team and try
again even though two were running track and three were playing soccer by
then and the team had to work around those two sports for practice time. They
were joined at that time by two sophomore members of the varsity team which
meant reworking the routine and changing all the stunts in a short amount of
time. They practiced on Saturdays, through the week after track and soccer
practice when there wasn't a track meet or soccer game and twice at 6:30am
before school.
So Saturday 12 cheerleaders from Franklin went to Atlanta, most with sore or
pulled muscles, one who broke a bone in her mouth practicing for this
competition, one with a bruised back, one with a bruised hip from soccer, one
who is in physical therapy for a weak ankle and one who woke up at 4:00am
that morning with the stomach flu. They proved that hard work,
determination, commitment and dedication pay off and that there is no
question CHEERLEADERS ARE ATHLETES!!
