This year has been a big year for baton twirling in schools across South County
The Mehlville Majorettes were crowned the 2024 National High School Halftime Champions for their routine “Barbie” at the National Baton Twirling Championship Competition in July, as well as the Regional High School Halftime Champions and State High School Dance Twirl Champions for their routine “Six.” The Oakville Tiger Twirlers also placed first at regionals and state, winning the High
School Dance Twirl category for their routine “MJ” and the High School Halftime category for their routine “Spy,” respectively.
“That’s the only National High School twirling competition,” Emily Hawkins, head coach of the Mehlville and Oakville and Vianney teams, said. “That’s what kind of makes them so elite and premier is that this is the only title that they could go get. It’s not like someone next weekend could be going to another competition where there’s baton twirlers and get a national title. Knowing that they’ve won national and regional titles is a big deal for the sport of baton twirling.”
But the titles do not stop there, as every twirling team member is also a member of Saint Louis Performance Academy, a baton twirling club team coached by Hawkins. SLPA not only won seven national titles this summer, along with being recognized as the top team at the United States Twirling Association National Competition held in Ohio, but the travel team – made up of 30 top-notch twirlers from SLPA – also qualified to be a part of Team USA for the 2025 World Competition in Turin, Italy, by placing first in five categories at the USTA National Competition. As the Olympics do not currently offer baton twirling, that is the highest level of competition for those in the sport.
“This is the Olympics for baton twirling. How awesome is it that Team USA comes from St. Louis – not everyone, but we’re a huge part of it … Going last year was amazing. We qualified for two routines, and for Italy, we qualified for five. We didn’t expect to qualify in everything, and we did, so that’s super cool and super exciting.
“We’ll go there as Team USA, we have the mandatory tracksuit,” Hawkins said. “They have an opening ceremony that’s just like the Olympics – I cried. There’s people from all across the world, and they’re all speaking their own languages, and they all trade gifts with one another.”
“It’s a really big moment for all of us to get to meet other countries, to compete on this elite level, travel – just everything about it,” Kyleigh McCourt, recent Mehlville High School graduate and current twirler at Central Methodist University, added.
Though about a year away, the team is already preparing for the high-level competition. That keeps team members active and busy on top of regular club and high school or college practice.
“One thing about baton twirling that I think most people that don’t twirl don’t realize is how much of a sport it really is,” Oakville sophomore Chloe Ruth said. “Some people just see it as a hobby, but it’s very physical, very mental. You have to be able to memorize all these routines and the count of the music. You have to be able to do these eight minute routines and have the endurance to keep the energy up the whole eight minutes. There’s no downtime.”
“I think this type of training takes a lot of sacrifice,” Oakville sophomore Maddie Polzin added. “It takes a lot of sacrifice, but we’re all willing to do it, to be on this level and get these opportunities to compete at these different places. I think it takes a certain mentality and I think we all kind of adapted to it because we just love baton so much.”