BERLIN – A competitive cheer team from Millsboro, Del. placed 11th in a national competition earlier this month.
Glitz, a junior level 3 team from Shore Pride All Stars in Millsboro, Del. went head-to-head against 78 teams at a D2 Summit in Orlando, Fla. on May 14, where the group took 11th place.
Heather Colbert, program director at Shore Pride All Stars, said the team received a bid to compete in the summit’s wild card round in December. During that competition, Glitz took first place out of 24 teams and advanced to the final round.
“Just getting a bid to D2 Summit put us in the top 5 percent in the country,” she said. “Only one other team from northern Delaware got a bid to compete, none from the Eastern Shore of Maryland.”
Colbert said the Glitz team is comprised of 15 girls and two alternates with ages ranging from 9 to 14. The team spends four hours a week in the gym for practice.
“Every practice the girls run and condition,” she said, “about 40 pushups, 200 sit ups, 50 burpees and plank holds every practice just to name a few.”
Christy McCoy, owner of the Shore Pride All Stars gym, attributes the girls’ success to hard work.
“It was an honor to go and compete, but to move to finals was emotional,” she said. “The girls put a lot of hard work into it.”
McCoy said the team began working on routines in the fall and competed in a couple of competitions before receiving a wild card bid that would take them to Orlando.
“They worked all year for it,” she said. “That team competed in November and wiped the whole competition.”
The D2Summit is a national competition for gyms with 125 athletes or less. McCoy said that the team’s advancement to a large-scale competition was an impressive feat for a young gym.
“It was a great showing,” she said. “In our second year, that’s hard to do.”
McCoy said the number of athletes has grown from 36 to well over 60 since she and her husband opened the gym.
“There is a lot to learn,” she said. “It has grown so much.”
Colbert said that the athletes make up nine competitive teams this season and compete in eight nearby competitions throughout the year.
McCoy added that the gym will host evaluations, or tryouts, May 27 from noon to 3 p.m. for kids ages 3-18 that are interested in joining Shore Pride All Stars. She said information can be found at www.shoreprideallstars.com or on the gym’s Facebook page.
“It will be a big day for us,” she said.
