My Nashville Adventure

I just arrived home from our weekend at the WGI Nashville Regional. Here is my recap:

We rehearsed on Friday night, and it was a little rocky, but we were still psyched and ready to go. We decided to leave straight from rehearsal at 9:30pm, so we loaded up and pointed the car towards Nashvegas, with our trailer in tow. We had planned on leaving early on Saturday, but with all the spackling that is required on this ole gal, we thought it better to get there, before heading to Antioch at 8:00am to do our sound check and get situated.

We stayed at the Embassy Suites, and had a very nice room with comfy beds, and we were quite happy to finally be there, and hit the hay before our big day. The alarm went off, at what seemed like, one minute after I finally fell asleep. It was the beginning of our long day. Omelette guy was box five. After breakfast, we left for the school, with high hopes and Rolaids.

WGI Regionals are always a little bit intimidating because there are so many guards from all over the country, and we had 11 guards in our class, all of which, had outstanding reputations. Honestly, we did not really know what to expect, since we had not had a performance since Field Day in January. We all had the case of the butterflies.

It was a costume extravaganza, with so much color and glitz, I did not know where to look first. Who doesn't love sequins and stretch velvet? The smell of vinyl and hairspray brought on a feeling of euphoria, which helped me relax, and I was ready.

Prelims began, and we figured out the flow of the competition, after some panic, profanity, and running in circles. The members all arrived, on schedule, and we headed in to help Bartlett pull their floor. After their performance, we went to our personal warmup time for some quiet stretching and focus. We made our way through the formal warmups with great anticipation. It was time to perform, and we were all so excited, and maybe just a little nervous.

The prelims performance was fine, but not our best run, which we attributed to nerves, but we were still hopeful, that the show had pleased the crowd and the judges. We retreated to the stands, for our first round of junk food and winterguard consumption. One of the girls brought everyone a bag of candy, which I proceeded to strap on, like a feed bag. As the scores were posted, we waited with great anticipation. When our score of 81.2 was posted, we could not have been more pleased.

We had earned the first place score and a place in finals. We were so excited and began to prepare for another run. The show in Finals, was much better than in prelims, and we were satisfied that we had delivered. Retreat is always a nervous time, and we waited for the placements to be announced. We were lucky enough to hold onto our first place finish, with a score of 84.1. We were honored to receive such a great score, wonderful crowd support, and a lovely plaque. Thank you to Bartlett and Houston, for their help with our floor.

We were able to watch quite a few guards, before and after our performances, and there were some amazing shows. What a great year this is going to be in WGI. I cannot wait until the Atlanta Regional, and ultimately World Championships.

High Points:

Performances/Scores - Yay!

Carmel - mylar balloons? Whodathunkit?

World Guards - OMG

Low Points:

Gymnasium Butt

Lady rolling down stands - Her dismount scored an 8.5.

Battle of the Boom Boxes