LJ Cheer: Captains

By Ed Piper

Cindee Russell, beginning her third full year as cheer coach at La Jolla High, was amazed. "Football teams don't do two-a-day's anymore?"

The subject was the Viking cheer squad's workout schedule leading up to next week's opening football game (Fri., Aug. 25). Russell is running cheer practice from 8 to 11 a.m., then 2 to 5 p.m. some days during the week.

Informed that high school and college football teams no longer organize "Hell Weeks" with practice morning and afternoon--due to health concerns, with annually one or more highly publicized deaths each preseason of high school or collegiate players who drop dead during or after practice--the cheer advisor was incredulous. She couldn't believe it.

But her spirited porristas resumed their morning paces, with Russell calling them out from a shaded spot behind the new equipment storage building at the northwest corner of the Edwards Field complex.

Veteran Julia Munson, a senior, is the new head team captain. Meanwhile, juniors Sydney Ochoa and Hailey Ramos--Ramos the catcher on the Viking CIF-champion softball team last spring--serving as co-captains. All have put in long hours and long years working on Russell's cheer squads of the last three years. They have earned their positions.

Russell, a glutton for punishment, continues to juggle the duties of cheer coach at La Jolla High, wife, mother, and full-time student. She resumed her studies full-time a year ago, and her schedule is hectic. She is a hard person to reach, when she is snowed in by assignments and her other responsibilities.