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Twirling not just for little girls
Tracy Meadowcroft, tmeadowcroft@pottsmerc.com
02/21/2005
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Photos by Daniel P. Creighton/The Mercury Spring-Ford student
Morgan Zimmerman is an accomplished twirler who has recently performed
during halftime at basketball games.
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Morgan Zimmerman can’t help but smile when
she’s twirling.
And the crowds that have seen her perform
during halftime at several basketball games can’t help but smile either --
and cheer --after her brief but energetic routines.
The 17-year-old Spring-Ford High School senior began twirling when she was 5
and competing when she was 7. Twelve years later, Morgan has amassed 200
trophies and awards for her twirling skills, many tucked away in closets and
corners of her home because there just isn’t enough space.
"I love it. I love competing, and I love the
adrenaline," Morgan said.
Now Morgan is teaching up-and-coming athletes the tricks -- or twirls -- of
the trade while making plans to attend college, hopefully Penn State
University. There, she could work with the Touch of Blue twirling team or
even become the team’s featured performer, known as the Blue Sapphire.
Morgan began twirling thanks to her mother, Rhonda. Rhonda Zimmerman twirled
with the marching band when she was a student at Pine Grove High School in
Schuylkill County and decided to get her daughter involved with the sport at
a young age.
"I just knew I liked it, so I thought Morgan might give it a try,"
Zimmerman said. "She took a liking to it, and I think it works with her
goal-oriented personality.
"We’re very proud of her," she added.
When she was 10, Morgan began setting goals for herself as she worked her way
from the lowest-level twirling competitions to the advanced, and highest,
level at which she could compete.
A fellow twirler, Jenna Moser, now a 19-year-old student at Lebanon Valley
College, also became a role model for Morgan.
"When she was 8 and I was 6, I looked up to her," Morgan said.
"She always worked hard, was dedicated, took practice seriously and she
always had fun."
Morgan incorporated those ideals into her work with twirling.
At one time, Morgan was also involved with dancing and figure skating. But
she eventually decided to dedicate more time to twirling.
"It wasn’t even a question," Morgan said.
She’s going to give track at Spring-Ford a try this spring, though, and is a
member of the high school cheerleading squad. Two of her fellow cheerleaders
also twirl, Morgan said.
When not taking private lessons, as a youngster Morgan spent much of her free
time practicing her twirling skills and routines in the driveway of the
family home, which she shares with her parents and 13-year-old brother, Erik.
"I practiced whenever I could," Morgan said.
Through her lessons she learned basic twirling skills such as
"fingers," twirling the baton on the fingers; "rolls,"
rolling the baton over the arm, back, neck, elbow or other area; and
"vertical series," vertical and horizontal baton tosses, Morgan
explained.
She then moved on to working on the choreography for her competitions. Morgan
has even choreographed some of her own routines as well as those of other
performers.
The routines are usually under three minutes and set to standard marching
music, she explained. Show twirls, however, are choreographed routines set to
popular songs and are what Morgan performs during halftime.
Twirlers can compete both alone and with groups, with one to three batons or
in "Super X" or "strut," which is a routine designed to
show flexibility and balance, Morgan explained. Competitions also involve
modeling and interviews, she said.
Twirlers must fill their routines with skills that show difficulty, technique
and variety, with points deducted each time a batons falls or is not in
motion, Morgan said. Many twirlers still go on to win, despite penalties, she
said.
Morgan has attended local, regional, state and national meets, traveling to
Florida, Ohio and Notre Dame University in Indiana, among other places. She
has captured numerous titles in competitions sponsored by organizations such
as the National Baton Twirling Association and Twirling Unlimited.
But performing for a crowd of her peers and parents made her nervous, Morgan
admitted even though she volunteered to do it as something different for
halftime.
"My hands get clammy and I get nervous," she said.
"But people say they’ve never seen anything like it," she added,
noting some people think twirling is just for little girls.
©The
Mercury 2005
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