Redwood Dance Force Dances Their Way to the West Coast Elite

By Ella Chan

On Saturday, January 13, Redwood High School’s Dance Force team was out in Castaic, California dancing for one of their bigger events of this year. 

Dance Force competed in 4 dances consisting of pom, lyrical, and hip-hop. They were split by the size of the group (extra small to large) and division, consisting of beginner, intermediate, and advanced.

Specifically, our Dance Force team competed in:

Medium Pom 

Small Contemporary 

Medium lyrical 

Large hip-hop 

Michela Pasquini, ‘27, danced in large hip-hop and medium lyrical. Like most of the team, Pasquini looked forward to showing off their hard work ever since the beginning of the first semester.

She finds that the experience allowed her and the rest of the team to grow together. 

“Personally, this was one of my best performances. I feel like with all our practices it really helped and we really put everything into it and gave it our all.” Savannah Vargas, ‘24, says. With all their practices since August, Vargas found it was effective in their performance and their dance proved true.

Jasmine Gomez, ‘27, says there were around 5 to 6 practices over their winter break. These practices were for 2 hours, allowing them to really perfect their dance with the big-time chunk. 

Dance placed 2nd in medium pom, 3rd in small contemporary, 1st in medium lyrical, and 1st for large hip-hop.

Through this success, there have been a couple of bumps in the road, such as injuries, which dance has since then overcome and adjusted for their safety.

Vargas says, “I always get worried getting into it [the competition]. But I always tell myself ‘You got this, you can do it’, and I feel like we had a good energy going into our dance.”

Gomez competed in the large hip-hop dance. She says, “I was just really nervous because it’s my first year, but I was really excited to do it with the team and be with them.” She enjoyed watching all the schools perform and her team compete. 

Marileigh Coon, ‘25, says that despite their slight nervousness for their first big competition, they managed to get “hyped” after their first dance. Coon participated in hip-hop, lyrical, and pom.

“I was definitely nervous for all the turn sections,” she says, but she believes it still went really well for them. 

Tags: dance, dance force, dance force competition, elite, rangers, Redwood, redwood gigantea, redwood high school, redwood journalism, redwood rangers, rhs, visalia ca, west coast