Coupeville Sports

Mica Shipley (Submitted photo)

Mica Shipley knew early on she wanted to be a cheerleader.

“I’ve been doing All-Star cheer since I was six,” she said. “I started because I was so mesmerized by all that was going on and I wanted to do that.”

Shipley will be moving to the next level this fall, when she enters Coupeville High School as a freshman.

A two-sport athlete (she also competes in track and field), she has embraced the opportunity to join the Wolf cheer squad.

“My favorite thing about cheer is tumbling and flying,” Shipley said.

She credits her mom with having “a huge impact in my life” and enjoys spending time with family and friends when she’s not busy with cheer.

“My mom is such an inspiration in my life,” Shipley said. “She is an inspiration because she never gives up and she encourages me to do the same.

“I got hurt very badly a while back and I was going to give up on cheer and if it wasn’t for my mom I wouldn’t be the person or cheerleader that I am today.”

In school, Shipley looks forward to her creative writing class, while away from the classroom she tries to spend as much time at the beach as possible.

While the battle over whether cheer should be viewed as a sport or an activity will probably rage on forever, there is no doubt how the Wolf frosh feels on the subject.

“I think that cheer is a sport, because even though we are not competing against a team we are doing just as much, maybe even more work then the football players,” Shipley said. “For example, we have to lift people in the air, which takes a lot of strength and conditioning.”

There’s also the intensive amount of work the Wolves put in under coach Cheridan Eck.

“We also have to tumble, which means a lot of practice and we have to learn all the cheers perfectly and we have to do jumps which takes a lot of stretching,” Shipley said. “So, even though we do not go against anyone, we practice like we are.

“We are going against ourselves to get better and better each game,” she added. “In my opinion, that’s a sport.”