The Twist

I was a freshman on my high school’s dance team and we were finally down at UDA’s High School Dance Team Nationals in Orlando, Florida, what we had been working towards all year. We had countless hours of practice, morning and night, and a ton of fundraisers to raise money for it. Dance is a heavily competitive sport that takes more time and money than most people think. Right when we got to our hotel rooms, we unpacked and got ready for practice. There were numerous teams already out in the parking lots with their knee pads and poms practicing when our team was finally ready. We found a small space of unused pavement and got to work. Everything was going smoothly, and we all thought to ourselves that nothing could go wrong. But little did we know what was going to happen the next day.

Early the next morning around 6 a.m. we all met for breakfast and then it was back to our rooms to get ready for the long day ahead of us. After four hours of getting our hair and make-up done perfectly the same, we got in costume and headed off to busses, which took us to where prelims would begin. Check-in point after check-in point, we finally arrived at the huge air conditioned tent and awaited our turn to enter. Inside were three stations that you were at for fifteen minutes each. Five minutes after we got there, a staff member instructed our team to follow her to Station 1, The Warm up Station. We got into three lines and began our stretching routine that we did at the beginning of every practice, making sure we concentrated only on stretching and not watching the other teams in the tent. Having five minutes to spare, we all warmed up a little more in our own ways. Some girls jogged in place, others did jumping jacks, while the rest including myself practiced our dance in place.

Another staff member gathered us up and we moved to Station 2. At this station we were able to practice our dance with counts. We immediately got into our first formation, a double v, with no time to waste, holding our beginning pose until we heard the “5, 6, 7, 8”, of our coaches voice. From then on, while I concentrated on making all my moves strong and precise, all I could hear was my coach’s voice saying “1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.” This went on for a while with a few interruptions to fix mistakes. Those fifteen minutes flew by, and before I knew it, we were moving to Station 3, Practice with Music.

Once again we hit our first formation with no time to spare. Everything was going smoothly until “thud…” Jolie, one of the juniors on the team hat hit the floor with tears in her eyes. My heart dropped and as I looked around at all my other teammates, we all seemed to share the same expression of disbelief. We couldn’t believe that twenty minutes before we had to perform, one of our girls had severely twisted her ankle. It started to swell immediately.

With no time to redo formations we were placed “on deck” as one of the staff members told the judges about our situation, so they wouldn’t take off unnecessary points for there being a gap in the formations. What started out as excitement had quickly turned into nervousness, as we waited for the announcer to announce our team. Those few moments that passed seemed like hours as we all, in our own way, tried to collect ourselves to go out there and perform like nothing had happened. While trying to collect myself, I was interrupted by the announcer saying, “Now performing is the team of Millard North High School.” As the crowd cheered, we spirited on and got into formation. The music started right away so I had no time to get more nervous. Two minutes and forty-five seconds flew by as we ended in our final pose. The crowd cheered as we spirited off. We were greeted by the smiling face of our coach and Jolie who was now in a wheel chair to prevent further injury to her ankle.

Now all we could do was try to relax and wait for the final dances to