Staff Writer

On Sunday, the Laurens Winterguard gave itself an anniversary gift.

The Jaguars won their first regional competition in their 35-year history, with a score that made them the No. 5 team in the nation.

"We've gotten second a lot," said Junior Julia Clark, 17, a six-year veteran of the senior guard. "This year it was really nice to have first."

The Jaguars received a score of 90.6 in the Scholastic Class A finals during the Winter Guard International Mid Atlantic Regional competition in Norristown, Pa., on Sunday.

Winter guard is an indoor color guard group that performs routines combining dance moves with handling equipment such as rifles, sabers and flags.

"When you hear someone say `Oh yeah, I throw a rifle in the air,' it's not like you just chuck it," Clark said. "There's precision and timing, it has to rotate the exact same way every time ...Ÿit's a really intricate and detailed process putting a show together."

The Jaguars will perform April 5 for the public. The time and place have yet to be announced.

During competition the teams are judged on items such as timing, movement, how they handle equipment and general effect.

The groups started their season a few weeks earlier this year, said the guard's director, Beth Wunderlich, who also cited the team's cohesiveness as a factor in its success.

"They're a good group of kids that get along very well and like to be together," she said. "They work hard at practice and make attempts to improve."

Beth Calhoun, the team's designer and instructor, said, "We were hoping for top three, that they were going to perform well and feel good about their performance."

Clark said she was a little nervous during the preliminary round.

"For finals, we were so relaxed and just had so much fun, I didn't worry about any bad things," she said.

The team will be heading to the WGI World Championship in Dayton, Ohio, on April 10 to 13, where it will face 117 to 128 other guards. This is the team's second appearance at nationals following a 10-year absence because of financial reasons, Wunderlich said.

Last year, the team finished in 26th place and made it to the semifinals. Both Clark and Wunderlich said the goal this year is to make the finals, limited to the top 15 teams.

"We were really excited (last year) but it was our first year going so we weren't banking on making finals," Clark said. "But this year, it's a little more pressure from ourselves."

The team is also competing next weekend in the Mid York Circuit Championships, its local competition circuit, in which the group is undefeated, Wunderlich said.

The team practices about 10 hours a week during the season, Calhoun said, and also held practices during the summer and fall.

Clark said the time commitment can make it difficult for some to juggle color guard with other activities, though she said she's involved in several.

"It's really time management and it's just doing what you love," she said. "We have a very small guard, and everybody loves performing."

The 13-member team is supported by the school and also does a lot of fund-raising to cover costs, Wunderlich said.

The Laurens team is somewhat unique because it includes students from seventh and eighth grades, as opposed to just high school students, she said.

"Laurens is a small school and we pull talent from wherever we see it," Wunderlich said.

The school has a junior guard program that feeds into the senior guard, Calhoun said.

"Everyone is always really surprised how young our kids are but they're really, really good," she said. "I'm just lucky that our young kids are so talented and I think it's because we have a solid junior guard program that really trains our kids."

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