It was the call that 22-year-old Faith Ward had dreamt of making since she was little.
The call that defined all the late nights of practice and money spent on costumes, as she dialled home to say she had made it as the newest member of the prestigious Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders team.
Born in Wellington, Ward is the first Kiwi representative in the famed American cheer squad.
She said it had been a hectic journey to get there, but a great one that started back in New Zealand.
“[I was] growing up young and in Wellington, loving dance, not really having any idea if it was going to take me anywhere. I just genuinely loved it,” she told NZME.
Ward attended a “very small, intimate school”, just north of Porirua, where she believes knowing all the teachers’ names was a great way to grow up.
“I feel like that definitely shaped me into the person I am today; it’s very crazy to think that that’s where my life started,” she said.
Ward’s mum was a dance teacher at the Wellington School of Dance, and started taking her to her lessons.
Ward recalls joining in, prancing around with ribbons to avoid being bored.
She said she didn’t even initially want to dance, but her mum noticed a natural rhythm and encouraged her to sign up for a few lessons.
The dance lessons quickly became more competitive, and before she knew it, she was “winning a few awards, was like, ‘Oh, I’m actually maybe kind of good at this’,” she said.
Wellington School of Dance teacher Suzanne Denton started teaching Ward from age of 4, and said she had immense talent and determination.
Ward was part of the dance school’s competition teams and had a natural ability. Denton said she “was a delight to teach”.
The whole team was incredibly proud of her, and the achievement just “shows what kind of person she actually is.”
Denton said Ward is a true inspiration for the next generation of dancers that she teaches, and “coming from NZ, being able to achieve something like this on the world stage is very inspirational for all dancers”.
Ward recalls begging her mum to let her try cheerleading at Big Air gym in Tawa as well as dancing, as that’s what “all my friends from school were doing”.
Big Air was Ward’s first taste of cheerleading, which she said brought out a whole new side of the sport, and made her stronger as an athlete.
An appearance on children’s TV show What Now when she was 8 was a defining moment, where the gears clicked and she realised this was what she wanted to do as a forever job.
“That’s where I kind of went, ‘there’s some opportunity in dancing. I could make this a thing’.”
Fast forward to the past few weeks, which Ward dubbed some of the hardest, most gruelling weeks of her life: she has made her dream come true as a Dallas Cowboy.
The Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders are renowned as one of the world’s top cheer groups. Thousands of dancers go through intense training camps each year to try and secure a spot among the elite. They have been performing at Dallas Cowboy’s NFL games since 1961.
Ward said during training camps, they would be shown a dance taught just the day prior, and have to perform the entire routine. If the coaches weren’t impressed, they’d cut them from the programme on the spot.
The cheerleaders became a global phenomenon with the launch of Netflix docuseries, America’s Sweethearts: Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, which came out last year, showing a glimpse of what goes on behind the scenes.
It’s an achievement no Kiwi has made before, becoming America’s newest sweetheart.
“I’m honestly so honoured and so privileged to be representing NZ,” she said.