Most people only dream of witnessing the Grey Cup from a front row vantage, but Niverville resident Coty Loeppky had the opportunity to experience the game from the sidelines on Sunday in Calgary.
Although he wasn’t just another fan watching from afar. Loeppky, along with the rest of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers cheer and dance team, spent the CFL championship hyping up the crowd at McMahon Stadium.
“I never thought of performing at a Grey Cup like this,” he says. “Honestly, it’s one of the most breathtaking experiences I’ve ever had performing.”
Loeppky’s experience began early on Thursday, performing routines at the Grey Cup festival all weekend leading up to the big game. But it wasn’t the first time for the 28-year-old. He attended the Grey Cup as a cheerleader in Vancouver in 2014 as well as in Winnipeg in 2015.
In his three years cheering with the Bombers, this was the only time he has represented Winnipeg when the city’s own football team was also competing.
To prepare, he and the rest of the dance and cheer team underwent intense training all season. Although the group didn’t know the Bombers would be in the Grey Cup, of course, they still had to practice—because all CFL teams’ cheerleaders and stunt people attend the championship, he explains.
The team spends four to eight hours a week in the gym training. Their routines include everything from basket tosses—throwing an individual, known as a flyer, in the air and catching them—to a stunt where the flyer is flung into the air and stands on one leg.
Many of their exercises are reflective of the cheerleading movie Bring It On, to which the team paid tribute in their routines at the Grey Cup.
The sport doesn’t come without exhaustion, he says. Some of their routines last around seven minutes, and at the festival they performed one routine 13 times.
“[That] alone is physically and mentally draining,” he says. “It’s an intense sport.”
Loeppky, a self-employed subcontractor, has a history of cheer well beyond his time with the Bombers. Seven years ago, he joined Scorpions Elite Cheer, which helped him prepare to be on the Bombers squad.
His Grey Cup experience didn’t end on Sunday, though. Loeppky took part in the Blue Bombers celebratory parade in Winnipeg on Tuesday, November 26.
Loeppky says initially he wasn’t planning to return to the Bombers’ cheer and dance team, but following this season’s experience, he says joining the team again next year will be on his to-do list.
“It’s super rewarding. I’m super blessed to have had the opportunity to represent Winnipeg,” he says.
