Header image for Interrobang article CREDIT: THE BLACK FALCONS
The Fanshawe Black Falcons celebrated their seventh national power cheerleading championship in eight years when they defeated Humber at the end of November 2013.

Did you know there are over 30 students on campus who are national cheerleading champions?

The Fanshawe Black Falcons have been a team for seven years and hold six national championships under their belt.

Impressed yet?

The Black Falcons competed in the Power Cheerleading Athletics (PCA) National Championships at the tail end of November last year, battling the team's biggest rivals, the Humber Hawks, to bring home the ultimate prize.

The team's fearless leader is David-Lee Tracey, a coach for 33 years of the cheer teams at Western University. Tracey, originally a cross-country skier during his undergrad years, knew members of the cheer team and joined because “it just looked like fun.”

After graduating, Tracey stuck around and became coach of the team.

“Numerous times along the line there, we always had these kids from Fanshawe saying, ‘How come we don't have a team? Start a team over here,'” he recalled. “I knew some kids over [at Fanshawe] ... and sort of put things in place and said, ‘Let's give it a go.'”

Tracey's Black Falcons have been wildly successful since the beginning, but are not officially affiliated with the college, so recruiting requires a different approach.

“For some idiotic reason, we're not allowed to advertise on campus,” said Tracey. “I tell the kids to play around, get seen. You don't need a mat, you don't need to be in a gym, you can go out in the street if you want to.”

Fanshawe student and Black Falcons cheerleader Julia Piccoli said the team would do stunts on campus to attract prospective teammates.

“People don't ever see people doing back tucks in the air or doing a whole bunch of flips and stuff,” she said. “They'll come over and they'll see we're cheerleaders for Fanshawe.”

Piccoli does think becoming a varsity team would add a lot more to being on the team.

“It will obviously get more school publicity and it's an awesome sport,” she said. “It would give us another level so we could go to more super awesome competitions; instead of going to two competitions a year, we could go to three or four.”

But the thing that irks Tracey the most is perhaps the lack of recognition the athletes get.

“It would be so nice for somebody from [Fanshawe] to get off their behind and actually write a note and say to us, ‘Hey guys, I know you're unofficial, but dang it all, you're doing a good job for us. You go out there and you represent our school well,'” he said. “Would it kill anybody over there to do that?”

“[The athletes'] experiences of Fanshawe College are greatly enhanced by being part of this thing, whether the school wants us or not.”

His spirits are high regardless, especially after accomplishing one of his goals in 2013.

“Our long-time rival has been Humber College,” he said. “They're the only team that has beaten us and they beat us last year, so we needed to get that back.” Which they did.

In the meantime, Tracey will be looking to build a bigger and better team.