Jacksonville is hosting the nation's top
twirlers in the u.s. national baton
twirling championships in fact more than
700 of the top twirlers from around the
country are going to be in town over the
next few days we have two champs with us
this morning
we have Savannah Miller and Michael
Lopez thank you guys for coming in
really appreciate it we even see a
little bit of you know of what you were
doing I mean it's it's it's really
amazing to me one of the things we said
is that is that it's not like your mom's
twirling and I have I hate to say that
because my mom's watching right now but
it is what makes it different these days
the thing is it's a lot of athleticism
involved you know we're having to have
the endurance of a football player a
sprinter we're having to do dance
gymnastics all in all underneath the
baton so anything together yes so tell
me about this competition that's
happening in Jacksonville yes so this is
our national championships and we have
over 760 athletes coming to compete this
week and it started on Sunday and we had
athletes competing then and we have our
finals today for our individual athletes
and then teams that will start tomorrow
so it's a really big competition a
really big deal that we're here in
Jacksonville this is a big competition
but there's a bigger one that's coming
up this summer yes what's that what's
that one but that is our world baton
twirling Federation's world
championships and so we're so like
Savannah and I were actually gonna be a
part of the freestyle event individually
yeah that's how long have you when did
you start twirling well I started at a
late age most girls like to start around
3 to 5 years old I started at the age of
14 and 23 now well you're fantastic what
did you start this is my 18th year
twirling all right I'm gonna put this
down they're gonna teach me something I
don't right now my mom is like no no no
ok alright here we go we're teach you
how to do I call them in chocolate
vanillas ok so hold on your right hand
ok so you're gonna scoop vanilla ice
cream on your right side and then you're
gonna scoop chocolate on your left side
ok say you got boys ok soon as you get
faster start to straighten okay now now
your I gotta slow it back down here for
a minute ok
I can't I can't do it like yeah can you
guys demonstrate some of the tougher
stuff that you do I'm gonna back up a
little bit so I'm out of your way
all right so show me some of that what
are some of these moves called this is
photo Fuji means so this is considered
our roles and Michael's doing elbow pops
over there so he's popping it on his
left arm as Vuitton comes around and you
can switch and do your own variation of
different things that's really amazing
and then and you guys now work with two
three batons I was I was seeing that
Michael I got a three again Sam yeah
it's a little bit more hard it's a
little bit harder than it looks so I
mean I don't know how it could be harder
than it looks because it already looks
amazingly hard oh you see a nice drop to
you but you know what but it looked like
you meant to do it that's the crazy
thing but if you just go with that you
know or is you got to keep going crowd
doesn't know I know right so what does
it take to win one of these competitions
I'm really I mean just it's it just a
combination of everything together it is
a little bit of a combination of a lot
of different things I know for myself I
trained about two to three hours every
single day and that's not including a
workout on top of that so you could
train up to six hours every single day
throughout the year and I never take a
day off so it's a constant all about
consistency and making sure you're doing
the right things along the way do take
this on dates with you well good luck
you guys I'm so excited thank you for
coming in I mean you're both amazingly
talented and if you would like to go
watch this you can be there at 4:00 p.m.
starting today at Veterans Memorial
Arena all right I'm gonna try one more
time looks pretty good wait I was gonna
try to throw it up higher
[Laughter]