With this year’s competition season approaching, many Royal dancers are eager to compete. Long hours of practice and perfecting techniques have been implemented so the girls can shine while performing each routine.

The Royals are scheduled to compete at the Crowd Pleasers contest Feb. 11 and the American Dance and Drill Team competition Feb. 25.

“I’m extremely excited to see how we’ll come together as a team during our contests,” sophomore Bailey Kerns said. “We’ve grown as a team since our first few rehearsals in the summer, and hopefully, we’ll show that, and all of our hard work will pay off.”

Coach Amy McKee agrees that the team has grown, and has some specific goals for the dancers.

“We want to be competitive and perform clean, high energy routines,” she said. “I’m providing highly technical routines to the team and challenging them to grow as dancers.”

To help them improve, like other athletes the girls put in hours of practice to perfect their routines.

“We spend two hours every day at practice,” McKee said. “For competition season, we average four team routines, three ensembles and three officer routines.”

The girls are expected to put in lots of energy when performing their rigorous dances. McKee said they are focused on the competitions ahead, but she is even more focused on the progress each girl makes with individual skills.

“My expectations for the team is to work hard in practice, listen, apply correction, and to enjoy performing,” McKee said. “We talk about the good days and the bad days, but in the end, it’s all about the journey and what each dancer puts into it.”