Ricky Henne, Managing Editor
Chargers.com
September 4, 2014
The hottest dance team in the NFL debuted their calendar Wednesday night.
For the Charger Girls, nothing beats cheering on the Bolts from the sidelines of Qualcomm Stadium each and every home game.
However, their annual swimsuit calendar is an awfully close second.
“This is definitely second to game day, and at this moment right now it may even be first,” said Natalie, a team captain and longest tenured member of the squad. “It’s just a different experience when they unveil the photos because you don’t know what to expect. You were there and wore the outfits but you don’t know what it looks like until tonight. So this is a really nice surprise for all of us and it came out great.”
The Charger Girls honored San Diego by shooting against the backdrop of the iconic Hotel Del Coronado. Team photographer Mike Nowak has shot the calendar since 1999, and this year’s ranks among the most proud finished products of his tenure.
“We went back to the beach this year, but we had the opportunity to shoot at the Hotel Del,” he said. “You can’t beat that because it’s iconic San Diego with the hottest dance team in the NFL! The girls are amazing to work with. They’re all professional women, amazing dancers and are very easy to work with. They make every day fun to go shoot on location, and the calendar came out great.”
Overall, Charger Girls Director Lisa Simmons is particularly proud of the 2014-15 calendar because of this iconic tie to America’s Finest City.
“This year’s calendar is extremely special because it represents San Diego in a way we’ve never been able to capture it,” she said. “Shooting at the iconic Hotel Del Coronado, we were able to get the beautiful surrounding beaches and the unique parts of the hotel that truly represent San Diego and what a beautiful city it is.”
The shoot occurred over a four-day stretch earlier this summer, and the finished product was held tightly under wraps until Wednesday night at Moonshine Flats in the Gaslamp Quarter. With the entire team in attendance, Simmons unveiled each photo to loud cheers and a standing ovation. The girls also learned who would grace the cover, which was especially moving for veteran Tawnie who was selected to be on it for the first time.
“Seeing my photo on the cover, I just couldn’t believe it!” she said. “When they showed it my view was kind of blocked, but then all the girls starting shouting ‘Congratulations’ and then it kind of hit me. It’s an incredible honor to be on this team, so it’s incredible to even be on the cover.”
Be the first to showcase the 2014 Charger Girls Cheerleaders to your home or office! The 2014-15 Charger Girls Swimsuit Calendar is now on sale for $17 or get an Autographed Calendar, signed by all 28 Charger Girls for $45
Squad held fashion show Thursday night
By Brad Evans
September 4, 2014
The Ben-Gal Cheerleaders will sport new uniforms on the sidelines this season.
The cheerleaders showed off their new outfits Thursday night at Scene Ultra Lounge in downtown Cincinnati.
View an interactive Bengals schedule
The squad donned the new apparel, then modeled it on a runway for all to see.
The new uniforms were designed by Ben-Gal alumna Kristen Schneider Bolt, who cheered for four years during her time at the University of Cincinnati’s DAAP School of Fashion Design.
Bolt said the new uniforms were edgier and trendier than anything else in the NFL.
“It’s been awhile since there’s been so much sparkle. And I have an affinity for all things bling, so we did big chunky crystals and I found that orange sequenced [sic] fabric so we blinged it out. You’ll see them coming from a mile away,” Bolt said.
Te Ben-Gals and their new uniforms will be making their season debut on Sept. 14 when the Bengals play the Atlanta Falcons at Paul Brown Stadium.
Tim Hawk
South Jersey Times
September 5, 2014
The Philadelphia Eagles Cheerleaders unveiled their 2015 Swimsuit Calendar at XFINITY Live in Philadelphia Thursday night.
The show began with the cheerleaders modeling their eco-friendly bikinis, made from recyclable materials, as images from the calendar flashed behind them. Following the fashion show, rookie squad member Alycia Guzman, a Rowan University sophomore from Deptford, was named this year’s cover girl.
The calendar was photographed in Riviera Maya, Mexico, and can be purchased at www.PhiladelphiaEagles.com, Eagles Pro Shops and bookstores nationwide.
[Sidebar: if anyone has any “back in the day” photos of Dawn, Heather, or Leslie, please let me know so I can update our “family” page. xoxo sasha]
Generation Next: The Seahawks have reached another milestone this season as rookie Sea Gals Taylor and Kylie are the daughters of former members of the team’s dance team.
Clare Farnsworth
Seahawks.com
September 4, 2014
As Heather Moyer and Dawn Cook sat side by side in the stands at CenturyLink Field for the Seahawks’ preseason opener on a picture postcard of a Friday evening, they were oblivious to everything going on around them. That’s because they were transfixed on two members of the Sea Gals.
But it was understandable, since the objects of their absorption were daughters Taylor and Kaylie.
And Taylor and Kaylie aren’t just any Sea Gals, they’re Generation Next members of the Seahawks’ dance team – the first-ever daughters of former members of the Seahawks’ dance team to make the squad. That’s right, Taylor is the daughter of Heather and her husband, Paul, who was a safety for the Seahawks from 1983-89, coached for the team from 1990-94 and now services as a member of the pre- and post-game show for Seahawks games on 710 ESPN. And Kylie is Dawn’s daughter.
Dawn, Kylie, Taylor, and Heather
Dawn was a Sea Gal from 1981-89, while Heather became a member of the squad in 1985. So they were more than just casual observers as their daughters – rookie Sea Gals – dashed through their routines.
“I was just so excited for her,” Dawn said. “I sent her an email and said, ‘Enjoy this moment. It’s going to be amazing. Something you’re always going to remember.’ ”
Little did Dawn know that her email also applied to her and Heather.
“It’s almost a fairytale, it really is,” Heather said. “We were giggling in the stands just watching them out there dancing.”
They haven’t seen anything yet, however, because Thursday night daughters Taylor and Kylie also will be dancing with the Sea Gals when the Super Bowl champion Seahawks kick off the 2014 NFL regular season by hosting the Green Bay Packers at CenturyLink Field.
How do the Generation Next Sea Gals view dancing into franchise history?
“I think it’s so surreal,” said Taylor, whose aunt, Leslie, also was a member of the Sea Gals. “But I also think it’s fantastic.”
While Taylor has an all-in-the-family connection to all things Seahawks and Sea Gals, her interest in becoming a Sea Gal was really ignited during her stint as a Junior Sea Gal.
“I grew up dancing my entire life,” said Taylor, who was a cheerleader at Bellevue High School and then went to Boise State. “I did Junior Sea Gals and subconsciously I just knew I wanted to be a Sea Gal. But I was kind of afraid to tryout, so I went away to college. Then this last year, I knew I really wanted it.”
Kylie, who also was a Junior Sea Gal, saw herself being a real Sea Gal before she actually became one.
“It was something that I had wanted to do for a long time, so I kind of already had pictured it in my head,” said Kylie, who went to Bonney Lake High School and Pierce College. “But I feel really honored. This is a first-time thing, so I feel like we’re almost a part of team history with it.”
It’s not just a feeling, it’s fact. There never will be the first Generation Next Sea Gals again. Kylie and Taylor have gone where no daughters of former Sea Gals ever have, and anyone that follows will be treading in their boot steps.
They never witnessed their mothers as Sea Gals, because they weren’t born yet, but they have seen video of them back in the day when the Seahawks played – and Sea Gals performed – in the Kingdome.
And now that they are the first to be the first, what was the initial reaction?
“I had been to Seahawks games before, so it was what I expected,” Kylie said. “But it was better than I expected, too, because it’s so different being down on the field instead of being a little nugget in the stands.”
Bay City News
NBC Bay Area
September 4, 2014
The Oakland Raiders have agreed to pay $1.25 million to settle a class action lawsuit that was filed by cheerleaders who alleged that the football team was violating state labor laws, including failing to pay the minimum wage, both sides said in a joint news release Thursday.
Raiderettes identified as Lacy T. and Sarah G. alleged in their suit, filed in Alameda County Superior Court early this year, that the Raiders had failed to pay their cheerleading squad in accordance with the requirements of state law.
But the Raiders said that they had proactively adjusted pay practices so that all Raiderettes were paid the full state minimum wage for every hour worked and overtime pay in 2013 before the suit was threatened or filed. Lacy T.
The parties now agree that the Raiders’ current pay practices appear to be lawful, according to the news release.
The million settlement covers 90 Raiderettes over the four-year period covering the seasons from 2010 through 2013, although only a small portion of the settlement is allocated to the 2013 season because the Raiders started paying minimum wage and overtime in that season before the suit was filed.
The settlement proposal, which won’t be finalized until a hearing on Sept. 26, would pay an average of $6,000 to each Raiderette for each season she worked between 2010 and 2012. For those who worked in the 2013-2014 season, the recovery would be about $2,500 each.
Rah! Rah! Sis Boom Bah!
By Alysa Offman
Metro Times
September 3, 2014
When they got their start five years ago, the Detroit Pride Cheerleaders were kind of a joke. Actually, that’s literally how they started. Andrea Wilamowski was catching a game with her husband and a Lions executive when the idea crossed her mind.
“My husband was a sponsor of the Lions, and we were friends with one of the executives that worked for them and it started out kind of as a little joke,” says Wilamowski. “We sat there and everyone was like ‘Why don’t we have cheerleaders?’ Because it’s really boring, you know, the two-minute warning and the places where you’d normally have entertainment, there’s nothing. So, as a joke, off the cuff, I just said I would start a team.”
So she gathered up some sponsors and struck up some interest and in 2010, she founded the Detroit Pride Cheerleaders. And they were all set to be the Lions’ first official cheer squad.
“This executive had said to me, ‘If you get the team started, you bring it to me and we’ll talk,'” she says. “We got a group of people and businesses interested and really wanting to pursue it, and I went back to the Lions and they said, ‘Oh, my God, this is wonderful, but we’re not ready yet. Maybe next year.'”
Now the team is heading into its fifth year, and they’re still not the Lions’ official squad. That doesn’t hold them back, though, and they aren’t shunned by the franchise in any way. In fact, players act as guest judges during tryouts and often attend the final showdown that takes place at the Fillmore.
“The Lions players appreciate us,” Wilamowski says. “They always have been excellent with us. They encourage us to keep doing what we’re doing and they appreciate the fact that we’re out there helping to support them and the city.”
Wilamowski says the franchise supports them, just not with cash, and it’s an expensive business to run. Just getting the girls into a game at Ford Field costs the team upwards of $4,000.
“We have to rely on sponsors and our calendar and our look book sales to keep the team going,” Wilamowski says. “I didn’t start this team with a ton of cash in the bank because it was something we were doing for fun, but then it turned into something very serious right away. We have all of our different sponsors that we do business with, which is very helpful, but what people don’t realize is that we purchase our tickets when we go into the games.”
Ironically, the girls never sit in the seats those tickets belong to. Instead, they stand on the concourse, shaking hands and taking pictures with fans.
“As soon as the girls walk in, they’re smiling for three solid hours,” Wilamowski says. “They stand in three-and-a-half inch boots from 10:30 in the morning to 5:30 at night. We go on the concourse and lines form immediately. We separate the girls into different groups, and we put them in different places because if all of the girls stand in one place, there’s a massive line that forms all the way down the concourse.”
Sure, they get their share of creepy drunks who go for boob-grabs and upskirts, but more often than not, their biggest fans are too young to even contemplate such crudeness.
“I think that the biggest reward is when you see the little girls that are 4 to 10 years old, and the girls will hand them a pom-pom and take a picture and the look on their faces is amazing,” Wilamowski says. “To them, these cheerleaders are, with all their rhinestones and sparkles and their shiny poms, they’re a hero, they’re a princess. It’s a really rewarding moment.”
Felicia Kollias is entering into her second year as a Detroit Pride Cheerleader and meeting with those miniature fans is one of her biggest rewards. She gushes about those fan interactions, noting it was the biggest surprise of getting to be part of the Detroit Pride.
Kollias works as a receptionist at a hair salon and goes to school full-time for teaching. Cheering with the Detroit Pride takes up a considerable amount of her time, but to her it’s worth it.
“We perform outside for every home game,” she says. “We don’t just cheer. We do dances with the crowd, and there is lots of interaction. Rain or shine, we’re outside performing. Because we aren’t official cheerleaders, we’re able to have more interactions with fans.”
Being able to interact with fans is one reason Wilamowski likes the Pride’s independence.
“It takes a lot to put together a sanctioned team, and those teams spend most of their time performing,” she says. “Eighty percent of our time is spent on fan interaction, and 20 percent is spent performing. If we were to become an official team, it would be the opposite. Now we’re able to pick the charities we work with and the events we do; there’s a lot less red tape.”
Doing charity work is a big part of being a Pride cheerleader. In fact, they’re required to make philanthropic appearances and attend community events.
“The girls have a certain amount of charitable appearances that they have to do every year,” Wilamowski says. “They do not get paid for them. And they also do four or five community appearances that they have to do a year, and then after that they have the potential for paid opportunities, and we do a lot of appearances throughout the year, not only on game days but on off days, too,” she says.
While their schedule wasn’t solidified at press time, you can usually find the Pride cheerleaders inside Ford Field during games, but you won’t see them there during Monday Night Football due to the high cost of tickets. During that game, they’ll perform at halftime at the Fillmore at a special viewing party. Aside from that, fans can keep up with them on Facebook and their official website. — mt
Bios are up on the Falcons website. Click here to learn more about this year’s team!
Rie, Kelsey, and Lindsey
The ladies of the Los Angeles Clippers Spirit dance team recently completed their photo shoot for the upcoming NBA season. Here’s a little sneak peek at how the day went. [photo gallery here]
It took place at the Clippers training facility in Culver City, which is south of Los Angeles proper. This is the same place where they had final auditions in July.
(I tried to get a photo of the outside, but there’s a tree in the way)
As everyone who has been through it knows, on photo shoot day, there’s a lot of this going on.
It starts with hair and makeup to get everyone glamorized
Veronica looking lovely even half done with curlers in her hair
Brooke gets her hair done
Kellie’s all glammed up from the neck up. (Not so much from the ankles down.)
This was the outfit for the individual shots:
This one has just a slight shimmer under the lights. This team wears a lot of red. More than white. Much much more so than blue. Now that I think about it, Clippers blue may be a hard color to match. And I doubt the boots come in that color.
Lights! Camera! Action!
Once it’s time to get started, some of the rookies were a bit nervous, but the team’s director Audrea Harris was there to make sure everyone looked her absolute best, from head to toe.
Gabri (working it without even trying.)
Sharon
Natalie
Brianna
In between shoots, the crew from Fox was also filming for this year’s “Making the Team” special.
After all of the individual shoots were over, the ladies changed costumes. This was the costume for the group photo.
Karissa and Brianna after the wardrobe change.
And this happened:
I have no idea. I turned around and she was in the middle of doing it.
Audrea also took a turn on camera…
…and that was when we noticed the tinsel wall, and its many possibilities.
Sharon and Kellie started it.
The tv crew’s lighting set up was excellent, so we took advantage.
Yay! Sister photo with Tatum and Tyra!
Text thing I knew, it turned into this and this and this.
Veterans Kelsey, Brooke, Natalie, Tatum, Brittany, Kellie, Brianna, Candace, and Karissa
Just the vets for now. Nina was still shooting, so we didn’t get to to a rookie shot until after:
Rookies Gabri, Mariah, Tyra, Amber, Sharon, Jen, Nina, Veronica, and Roxy
The group photo went really quickly. Ten minutes. Fifteen max.
They lined everyone up by height, made a few adjustments, and click-click-click it was over.
The day started around 8am and everyone was finished by 2. It goes so fast! In prior years, the team shoot has been at the dance studio, and it’s followed by several hours of rehearsal. This year, they got a break. Once the shoot was over, they were free to go.
These are the faces of women visualizing the Double-Double and fries they’re about to order over at the In-n-Out Burger. (Mmmm….burgers…)
I’m not sure how long it will be before the Clippers site is updated with the new photos, so I leave you with a hit of what to expect.
ROLL CALL!
Amber (rookie)
Brianna (year 2)
Brittany (year 8 )
Brooke (year2)
Candace (year 3)
Gabri (rookie)
Jen (rookie)
Karissa (year 3)
Kellie (year 5)
Kelsey (year 3)
Mariah (rookie)
Natalie (year 2)
Roxy (rookie)
Sharon (rookie)
Tatum (year 3)
Tyra (rookie)
Veronica (rookie)
The San Diego Chargers website has been updated with individual profiles for this year’s Charger Girls. Click here for more!
Rookie Charger Girl Brittney
New team photo! Click to view full size.
