On Saturday, Aug. 25, colorguard traveled to Jacksonville to perform for the halftime show at the NFL preseason game between the Jaguars and Falcons. Alongside other high school cheer and dance teams, they performed a three minute cheer routine.

Team members were excited to perform, but wanted to perform a colorguard routine rather than a cheer routine.

“I didn’t sign up to be a cheerleader. We ended up getting pom poms, we had to wear long sleeve, long pants, black velvet uniforms in 90 degree weather,” sophomore Hannah Sanchez said.

Some members said that the cheer routine was less stressful than a normal guard routine. Freshman Savannah Hill described the routine as “easy to learn,” in spite of having to learn the second half of the routine the day the performance took place.

“I get nervous at tossing things, but since everyone around us was doing the same thing and not tossing things, it was more fun than stressful,” Sanchez said.

During the performance, 300 girls ran to line up and spell the word “Duuuval,” the name of the county where the game was played. This caused performers to fall and push each other around. This ended up injuring some performers, like junior Annie Yartz, whose shin got kicked when running across the field.  

In spite of all this, members were proud of the work that did, and when watching the videos of the halftime show, their mistakes such as the accident were not as noticeable as they seemed on the field.

“From the video we looked good because there were so many cheerleaders. I know I forgot most of it, but you couldn’t see it in the big picture,” Howell said.

The Jaguars won the game 17-6, and the team was proud of the opportunity to showcase their skills.

“It’s like you’re going to play for the NFL, it’s crazy,” Kayden Howell said, “You’re going to be in front of that huge stage, in front of all those people and on the big screen. It’s really exciting.”