League coach of the year and league player of the year honors are not a bad way to hit a mid-season stride. The EHS cheer team has a lot to… um.. cheer about.

Drew Martinez (12) was named league player of the year and Head Coach Ginger Rode was named as League Coach of the Year.

For Rode, the honors were earned by the team after putting in a lot of training, “We train four days a week for two hours each day. We do conditioning, weight training and lots of exercises to get ready for competition.”

At the league level, the team must do very specific routines, “Our routine consists of a music portion, cheer portion and finally another music section. In every section we are judged on our motions, dance, jumps, tumbling, stunting, pyramids, crowd leading, crowd effectiveness and overall impression.”

The routine is about 2:30 minutes in length, with 1:30 of that being all music. Rode says every squad performs a routine that either they choreographed or paid a professional to choreograph; therefore every routine is different with different moves, cheers, and stunts. The routine this year was put together by Rode, “Our routine this year, was choreographed by myself and a couple of members of the squad. I am not sure our routine was much different than the other squads, we just performed ours better. We hit our stunts. Our jumps were perfectly timed and looked great! The timing of the routine was on point.”

She believes the team won top honors because they had it together, “Our motions, voices, techniques, etc. were just sharper, tighter and more uniform.”

The Colorado 7 League is comprised of 8 schools that are a mix of 3A and 4A (Englewood (3A), Ft. Morgan (4A), Ft. Lupton (3A), Skyview (4A), Alameda (4A), Weld Central (3A), Arvada (4A) and Conifer (4A)).

Six of the eight schools sent a team to Competition: Englewood, Ft. Morgan, Ft. Lupton, Skyview, Alameda, and Weld Central. Three of those teams were co-ed, three were all-girl squads.

Englewood has two guys on the squad. Drew Martinez was named league player of the year. Rode believes he is a strong competitor, “I think Drew Martinez was named league player of the year for his motion techniques, co-ed stunts in the routine, and his amazing jumps.”

The jumps, detailed routines, and commitment to excellence is what made Rode one of the top coaches in the state, “I think I was named league coach of the year for our performance and improvement from last year. Last year we were 3rd out of 4 teams and this year we came in and had an amazing routine and improved so much from last year and previous years. The squad worked hard and their hard work paid off.

Coach Rode also said 6 of their cheerleaders were named all-Conference. Drew Martinez, Julissa Chavez, Justine Fama, Bria Look, Chelsea Carter, and Casey Kohler.