"The financial challenge was the biggest hurdle. I can’t talk enough about how grateful I am for your support. The Travers Foundation has lifted a giant pressure off me and gave me the most incredible experience of my life!"
To The Travers Foundation
Thank you so much for the grant to pay for my flight to the USA and made my dream a reality! I successfully applied for competition support for sportspeople and spent the summer (from June 24th to August 16th) touring the East Coast of America with Spartans Drum and Bugle Corps.
We spent everyday rehearsing for up to 10 hours, learning from the best of the best! My coaches were alumni of world class corps and I learnt so much from them. I gained proper technique, learnt new tosses, new tricks, my dance abilities were pushed, my confidence and performance quality was enhanced and just from all the rehearsals my stamina improved! Everything was on a completely different level to the Colourguard I had experienced back home. Performing on this global stage has been the peak of my colourguard career and it was absolutely incredible!
Thank you so much for the grant to pay for my flight to the USA and made my dream a reality! I successfully applied for competition support for sportspeople and spent the summer (from June 24th to August 16th) touring the East Coast of America with Spartans Drum and Bugle Corps.
We spent everyday rehearsing for up to 10 hours, learning from the best of the best! My coaches were alumni of world class corps and I learnt so much from them. I gained proper technique, learnt new tosses, new tricks, my dance abilities were pushed, my confidence and performance quality was enhanced and just from all the rehearsals my stamina improved! Everything was on a completely different level to the Colourguard I had experienced back home. Performing on this global stage has been the peak of my colourguard career and it was absolutely incredible!
We competed 15 times, with 10 of those competitions being in the final 2 weeks and a half! Spartans won 4th place in the Open Class category which meant we were one of the top 25 corps in the USA. This allowed us to surpass a couple of world corps and compete in the world championships at the Lucas Oil Stadium in Indiana! It was on a field unlike any other I’ve ever performed on and the whole experience was electrifying! Sharing the experience with 100 other people who were just as passionate about performing made it so much more special and I really became part of a family during my summer at Spartans; I miss everyone so much.
Since coming back from my summer of a lifetime, I competed with my local drum corps Liberty Drum Corps! We won championships of the championship league at the British Youth Band Association finals! I’ve also succeeded in recruiting more members and have been able to get us better equipment, teach the kids proper technique and I’ve also incorporated some of the group activities we used to do at Spartans to bring the entirety of Liberty Drum Corps together - not just improving the teamwork of the Colourguard section but the entire youth group! It created more ensemble time and made the entire corps a whole lot closer. The role of section leaders at Spatans was a lot more organised and I brought this to Liberty too! Now the section leaders of Liberty Youth Group meet up once a month to discuss improvements to liberty’s rehearsals making it a youth group that’s really run by the members themselves - our corps director has been really encouraging and supportive of our suggestions and it’s allowing leadership qualities to bloom within members that have previously not been so proactive in the corps. It’s been rewarding to see their growth!
Since coming back from my summer of a lifetime, I competed with my local drum corps Liberty Drum Corps! We won championships of the championship league at the British Youth Band Association finals! I’ve also succeeded in recruiting more members and have been able to get us better equipment, teach the kids proper technique and I’ve also incorporated some of the group activities we used to do at Spartans to bring the entirety of Liberty Drum Corps together - not just improving the teamwork of the Colourguard section but the entire youth group! It created more ensemble time and made the entire corps a whole lot closer. The role of section leaders at Spatans was a lot more organised and I brought this to Liberty too! Now the section leaders of Liberty Youth Group meet up once a month to discuss improvements to liberty’s rehearsals making it a youth group that’s really run by the members themselves - our corps director has been really encouraging and supportive of our suggestions and it’s allowing leadership qualities to bloom within members that have previously not been so proactive in the corps. It’s been rewarding to see their growth!
I love this sport so much and experiencing it at its highest level is something I will remember for the rest of my life. I improved so much more than my colorguard skills. Travelling to a country I’d never been to before to live with 100 people I’d never met before for nearly 3 months is something I’ll always be so proud of myself for doing! It improved my confidence and my ability to push past both mental and physical limits. I was only planning on going to perform over in the USA once but I really am considering doing it again this summer (it’s an activity you can only partake in under the age of 21)! The financial aspect of it all (considering I only work part time and am still saving to go to university) was the most difficult hurdle and the Travers Foundation really made it possible for me. I can’t talk enough about how grateful I am for your support - it lifted a giant pressure off me and I had the most incredible experience of my life!
Thank you to The Travers Foundation,
Riana Ao.
Riana Ao.