The world at her fingertips

  OSCAR ALVAREZ Internationally ranked baton twirler
Kellie Donovan is also working toward a double
major at UCLA.

By J.P. Hoornstra
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

It is a typical morning inside the Yates Gymnasium at the John
Wooden Center. The familiar sounds of shoes squeaking, rims
clanking and tank-topped teammates crying for a pass signify the
early round of basketballers hitting the hardwood. In a corner of
the gym, lost among the amateurs, a world-class athlete spins and
twirls to the beat of her own drummer, contained inside the boom
box that she takes along every day.

For Kellie Donovan, a three-time silver medal baton twirler, it
is crunch time. Winter quarter finals are less than two weeks away
for the ballers, but less than one away for her. Tonight, while the
morning gym rats watch the Pac-10 Tournament from their couches,
Kellie will prepare for the impending National Trials, with a
chance to compete internationally at stake.

And those who know Donovan know that she claws at any chance to
compete. The 21-year-old senior has already been in baton
competitions for 13 years. The chance to compete, she says, is what
keeps her going.

“When I perform and it was a great routine, it’s
just the best feeling, the high that you get from it makes it all
worth it.”

For an ordinary UCLA student, the sacrifices needed to maintain
a job, a double-major ““ political science and communications,
with a “really good” GPA ““ and an internationally
recognized baton twirling career would seem daunting. But Donovan
has adjusted to the lifestyle, and adjusted well.

“When my Sunday night flight gets delayed, I get here at
two o’clock in the morning. I have an 8 a.m. English class
and in between I have to write an essay,” Donovan said.
“My body’s sore because I practiced for nine hours on
Saturday and nine hours on Sunday. I have bruises, and have to go
to school and work.”

It’s a routine she’s been honing for a while.

As a child in Sacramento, Donovan’s mother signed her up
for a baton class with the local parks and recreation department.
She did other kid stuff, too ““ ballet, gymnastics, jazz band
““ but in the end, the baton won out.

“There came a point when I was 11 or 12 when I had to
choose which one I wanted to do,” she said. “I liked
baton the most, so that’s what I stayed with.”

When she started getting good at it, people noticed. Soon, her
talents were being chronicled in the Sacramento Bee, the New York
Times and on the Discovery Channel. She made her first national
team eight years ago and has not been left off the international
competition roster since.

When the inevitable decision to choose a college had to be made,
Donovan chose UCLA for its academic reputation. She had the
opportunity to go to Purdue and be its “golden girl” at
sporting events, but opted to pursue her degree in-state.

Her college years were also the time that her baton twirling
really took off, highlighted by a national championship in
2000.

According to Donovan, the best fringe benefit of being the top
American baton twirler are the road trips. That year, the Japanese
twirling federation invited her to go to Japan for 10 days and
teach. “Basically, they paid me to go there,” she
said.

Although it emerged as a competitive sport in the United States
in the 1950s, baton twirling has since exploded elsewhere in the
world. Recent championships have also been held in Holland, France,
Switzerland and Canada. But nowhere has it caught on more than in
Japan.

“I was on the street and someone who wasn’t even
involved in baton recognized me and asked for my autograph,”
Donovan said. “They even have a cartoon on baton twirling
there.”

To compete internationally again this year, Donovan must pass
the first stage: the U.S. trials in Wichita, Kan. on March 23.
Unlike tennis or golf, athletes don’t earn a baton twirling
“tour card” that ensures them a place on the team for
years to come.

Each year is a new try-out, with the top three finishers
competing internationally, and Donovan is pushing everything aside
to ensure that she makes it. She has arranged to take her final
exams a week early this quarter, catching study time during the
breaks of a practice schedule that demands 33 hours a week.

“It’s really hard to make the team,” she said.
“Every year it’s just as hard, if not harder, to be on
the team in the top three.”

Weekend practices ““ nine hours on both Saturday and Sunday
““ are held in Sacramento. This is convenient for Donovan, but
not for most of the other American hopefuls; twirlers fly in from
Florida, Oregon, Arizona, Texas, Santa Barbara and San Francisco
just to prepare for the competition.

Machelle Stiehl has coached Donovan in Sacramento for the last
10 years. Stiehl considers Donovan her best student, and is
confident about her pupil’s chances to make a ninth straight
world team.

“She has a lot of natural ability, but in addition you
have to have a lot of drive,” Stiehl said. “(Kellie)
doesn’t settle for second best.”

For Donovan, this means mornings on the basketball court,
attempting to avoid others with her baton while they avoid her with
their basketballs ““ so far, there have been no incidents.

It means working the first three years of college part-time to
support what she considers an expensive sport. “I don’t
know how I do it,” she said.

It means that “when people are lounging around or getting
ready for a party, I’m doing 50 things. But that’s OK,
it’s worth it.”

Her sisters in the Gamma Phi Beta sorority, Donovan says, are
understanding of the demanding schedule and international fame that
take her out of the social loop for long stretches of time.

“I definitely have a non-existent social life,” she
said. “But, I mean, how many date parties and fraternity
parties can you go to? They’re all the same after you go to
one. So I don’t feel like I’m missing that
much.”

Anything for the chance to compete.