This year has been a crazy one for Doherty’s cheerleaders. The “practices have been challenging considering the restrictions of Covid-19” this year according to cheerleader Elena Mansfield. It started off normal but when March hit, cheer practice was canceled, then in April when tryouts for the new season were supposed to be held, it was canceled. Then during the summer, a cheer camp was supposed to be held in Denver but was canceled, so instead, Coaches held a cheer camp at Doherty in June and July. Now we are here, with our Junior Varsity and Varsity teams that have been practicing and working hard since August. There have been a few restrictions but overall, it has been going smoothly. Both teams have been able to cheer at football games. “I was thrilled to get that experience again,” said Elena Mansfield of the Varsity team. In order to follow the Covid-19 rules, cheerleaders have also been wearing masks. “The masks have been a challenge for sure,” said Natalie Titus of the Junior Varsity team. Sometimes it can be a struggle to cheer and keep your voice heard behind a mask. Aside from cheering at games, both teams have been practicing at Doherty. Tuesdays and Thursdays for stunting, cheering, and conditioning. Then on Mondays and Wednesdays, the cheerleaders sharpen their tumbling skills on top of everything else. Currently, because there are not a whole lot of games to cheer at, they are looking forward to the beginning of 2021, where there will be basketball and volleyball games, but most importantly, it will be competition season. On November, Saturday the 7th, the Junior Varsity team practiced their competition choreography.

(Picture on the right, photo credits to Mikala O’Flynn).

The varsity practices and games have not been as normal this year. According to senior Kendall Berg, “I feel that we are lucky we get to cheer at the football games, but I do wish they were more like last year.” Another quote from cheer captain Azahra Forst “It felt great to cheer at games obviously it was different but at least we got to cheer for the crowd and scream our hearts out. I wish we could’ve been in front of the student section but that’s ok.” Having too socially distanced makes it hard for us to cheer on the boys. This year they have repositioned us to be behind the endzone due to COVID restrictions. Although we cannot cheer at the last game which was supposed to be on Friday, November 20th, we are excited to keep working and getting ready for competition season and crossing our fingers we will get to cheer at basketball and volleyball games.

Our practices have been very challenging for everyone when it comes to wearing a mask while tumbling, cheering, and stunting. Cheer captain Azahra Forst said “Practices this year were challenging. I think it was confusing because we were unaware of the limitations that we faced, and scheduling was confusing. I have loved working with the girls this year and building strength.” We practice at Doherty on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and at Steele Athletics on Mondays and Wednesdays. This year we have an amazing team and we have been able to try awesome new stunts and tumbling skills! Although we have had some injuries, we all help each other get stronger and build back up to where we were. Due to some exposure throughout the cheer team, we have now been quarantined along with football so our fall season got cut short, but we are all hoping we will be able to have a safe season for basketball, volleyball, and competitions.