WASILLA -- Alex Koffard's initial reaction to the idea of joining Denali All-Stars, an elite cheer sport squad at Denali Gymnastics, was a definite thumb's down.
Then he checked out the Wasilla gym. To this all-around athlete, who was at the time a member of the Colony High School football team, the equipment-packed floor was like a giant playground. Despite his parents' worries he wouldn't have time to study with all his extra-curricular activities, Koffard landed a spot on the audition-only squad on his second try.
In two years, he mastered the complicated stunts and jumps the All-Stars required at a powerhouse level.
Now a correspondence study school graduate, Koffard has landed a tuition waiver from Hawaii Pacific University for his freshman year, thanks to his participation on HPU's cheer team. The team is more like a 'stunts-to-music' team in a hypercompetitive arena.
He is one of six All-Stars who have garnered offers of scholarships and tuition wavers from colleges in the Lower 48. Considering the squad is five years old, and that its members compete against hundreds of established teams on the national stage, it's an impressive percentage.
The All-Star squad -- most of them young women between the ages of 14 and 19 -- spin, jump and backflip their way through thrice-weekly practices year-round. The stunts, which have names like a round-off back handspring back tuck, or a back layout full twist, are of joint-pounding intensity. When Koffard completes a triple full twist at a level Olympic gymnasts strive to reach, he's a jaw-dropping blur only the fastest camera shutter can catch.
BATTLING MISCONCEPTIONS
Put Koffard on a gymnast's mat and respect would cover him like chalk dust. But when he told his fellow football players he was a member of a cheer squad, they jeered at him.
At first.
"I'd do a demo in the parking lot and it changed their minds," Koffard said.
The young women don't get quite the dissing as their male counterparts although they acknowledge it's out there. A common misconception is that their sport is like high school cheerleading as it was in their mothers' era, but the comparison ends at ponytails and short skirts.
Except for a token, single sentence cheer in the middle of their competitive routines, these squads don't cheer for anyone but themselves.
"People see a pep squad but that's not what we are," said Julie Hixenbaugh, whose 11-year-old daughter, Zoe, is on the Shooting Stars, a younger team that feeds into the All-Star squad. "There's a saying that some athletes lift weights but cheerleaders lift athletes."
Hixenbaugh is one of dozens of parents who commit to the year-round schedule. Families who drive from Eagle River and Anchorage form car pools to share the load. They fork over thousands of dollars in fees. They spend hours in the bleachers watching their children practice stunts and routines that still amaze them.
And now those skills have marketable value. As word circulated about teammates who were offered tuition aid, parents began considering the cheer squad in a new light.
SMALL START, BIG SUCCESS
Head coach Leon Reynolds said he's cultivating relationships with cheer schools that hand out the top financial awards in the sport, like HPU or the University of Kentucky.
Reynolds, whose parents started Denali Gymnastics 20 years ago, has taken Denali All-Stars a long way since his first audition. He and his mother, Sandy, lead a team of All-Star coaches that includes former members.
"We pretty much took anyone who was of age 13 to 18 who had a pulse and wanted to learn," Reynolds said of the first All-Star audition. "We took all 17 members who showed up. ... Most of our team had little to no experience, but by our first competition four months later, we claimed our first grand champion title."
This year, 120 athletes tried out for 35 spots on the Denali All-Stars team. Reynolds has them classified as a Level 5 team, the highest level of competition, where they've captured numerous titles, including eight Alaska State Grand Championships.
In 2006, the team rose to the top of 900 teams to capture first place at the CheerSport Nationals in Atlanta. This year, they were named national grand champions from the Pac-West Spirit Group against 129 other teams. That win netted them $10,000 in travel expenses to the Cheerleading World Championships in Florida last April.
"We are the first team in the Northwest to win a paid bid to Worlds," Reynolds said, adding that only the top 1 percent of national teams get a paid invitation.
HARD WORK PAYS OFF
Their rising profile, along with the scholarship possibility, is catching the imaginations of athletes like Alesha Davis. The 18-year-old Dimond graduate "super senior," a University of Alaska Anchorage freshman, has been with All-Stars four years.
"I was pretty dismissive of trying for a cheerleading scholarship until my first year at CheerSport," Davis said of the 2006 competition.
"I saw the 900 teams and the people there from colleges, talking to you and the coaches. It totally made me think I could do this and pay for school."
Davis plans on sending audition tapes to the University of Las Vegas or San Diego University.
She could join the ranks with Koffard, whose parents have warmed to both the sport and Denali Gymnastics as they've watched their son mature.
Kelley Koffard said her son took on odd jobs and eventually became a gymnastics coach to fund the expenses of his All-Star involvement.
"The scholarship was nice but it came out of the blue," she said.
"For us, we fell in love with the sport, and Denali Gymnastics, as we watched him take on the responsibility of: 'This is my dream and how am I going to make it happen.' "
Find Melodie Wright online at adn.com/contact/mwright or call 257-4200.
