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Baton twirler spins practice into titles
By MELIA BOWIE
© St. Petersburg Times, ST. PETERSBURG -- Soft-spoken, petite and able to twirl a baton faster than your eye can follow it, 20-year-old Angela Geiger is what the other girls at the Florida Twirling Institute refer to as a "lifer." It began 15 years ago with a plastic baton. It was neither a trendy toy nor a passing hobby. It was a passion for baton twirling that never went away. Now the Pinellas Park resident and St. Petersburg College student is a national champion. "It came natural to me," Geiger said of the skill. Ever the perfectionist, she stuck with it. "It brought me to where I am today." Those who don't know what twirling entails are prone to joke at first, said more than 15 girls who join Geiger on one of the institute's advanced twirling teams. They practice every Wednesday at the Walter Fuller Recreation Center. Equipped with baton shoes (a cross between sneakers and slippers), baton bags, their hair in matching ponytails and topknots, the teammates range from 13 years old to college freshmen. Twirling takes time to master for those motivated enough to brave the bumps and bruises of falling batons. "I've had most of these girls for five or 10 years," trainer Melodee Owens, founder of the Florida Twirling Institute, said during a break from practice one evening. In front of her, 21 synchronized batons glided across slender shoulders and slipped around elbows as the girls strutted to a tune from West Side Story. Although strangers and even "baton dads" (a nickname for institute fathers) may brag they could master twirling, they quickly take back those boasts after watching the complex moves and careful coordination of a practice or competition. Despite its athleticism, "baton twirling isn't recognized as much as cheerleading and football and we work just as hard," said Geiger, who in July became national twirl-off champion and was first runner-up in the Drum Majorettes of America "Queen of America" contest. Still, the sport attracts loyal participants. Take the twirling institute's founder, Owens, for example. Her parents, both twirlers, met at a baton competition and so began a legacy. Her father founded the Indiana Twirling Institute; her mother still runs the Florida Twirling Academy at age 71. By the time Owens was old enough to hold a baton, her parents had poured a slab of concrete in the back yard for her to train on. After moving to St. Petersburg in 1971, Owens began her own institute, and when her daughter Nicole came along, she, too, got a slab of concrete and a passion for the sport. Now 25 and married, Nicole Stidham jokes that she was teethed on a baton and was twirling when she was in diapers. (Her mother has the pictures.) "I twirled for 21 years and now I do this," said Stidham, a certified twirling judge. "I never really left. "I'm already designing my daughter's dance costumes," she said with a laugh, confessing she doesn't even have children yet. From baseball to ballet, many of the institute's students followed different paths before discovering twirling's challenge and camaraderie. Kristen Addison, an 18-year-old St. Petersburg College student, knew baton was for her in second grade. A decade later, she happily submits to four-hour practices with old friends as they prepare for competitions. "Ballet," she stated with authority, "was boring! All we did was have recitals." Here the teammates get a workout worthy of any high-intensity aerobics program. Music pounding, the girls stride and sashay around the gym. Their batons soar across the ceiling, as the twirlers catch -- and occasionally dodge -- the silver sticks. They get dirty, bruised and sometimes bloody, but they have fun, said members. "We like to say if baton twirling were any easier, it would be cheerleading," quipped Owens. Still, the sport is stereotyped, she said. Scholarships are few and far between, rarely more than $500. "A lot of people say to me: Oh, it's dying out because they don't see it as much anymore." Although many of her twirlers have extensive dance repertoires and can easily execute gymnastic flips and spins, band directors are used to one-trick majorettes or newcomers with varied skill levels. They don't realize what these girls can do, she said. And it doesn't help that the major twirling organizations refuse to join up to increase the sport's presence. No matter. Florida Twirling Institute members stay active on the competition circuit, winning trophies and titles. They attend baton camps and clinics, travel to local high schools and around the country for meets. The school even has a "tiny tots" class where twirlers ages 5 and younger are working on a routine to music from the movie Shrek. "Twirling is holding steady," Owens said. "It's not really growing, but it's not on the decline."
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