THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 1, 1994 TAG: 9406290112
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 18 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY ERIC FEBER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 93 lines
When Charlotte Elizabeth ``Beth'' Sawyer gets ready to walk on the stage of the Roanoke Civic Center to represent Chesapeake at the Miss Virginia Pageant, one inspirational saying will be going through her head.
It's not some flowery Shakespeare quote, stirring patriotic motto or awe-inspiring Biblical passage, rather the words the 23-year-old daughter of Charlotte and Jenson Sawyer will be heeding are simple and direct: ``Dog it!''
Not the kind of motto one would find in Bartlett's, but it has helped Sawyer through her life.
``When I was about 6 or 7, I began to take gymnastics with Ocean Tumblers,'' Sawyer said. ``I had this incredible coach, Ray Shackelford. He motivated me in everything. He was tough, but he was the best coach anyone could hope to have. He never had anyone give up, and wanted people to be the best they could be. He always had this one phrase before we did anything, whether it was practice or competition. It was `Dog it!' meaning go for it, stick to it. That has been going through my mind so many times in the past. It will go through my mind in Roanoke.''
Sawyer has been ``dogging it'' all through her life. From gymnastics to pageants, she never gave up.
Tumbling led Sawyer to rhythmic gymnastics. She got so good at it, she competed at a gymnastics event in Princeton, N.J., in 1985, earning one of the top six spots in her region. That earned her a stint at the U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo. for an intense two weeks of gymnastics training.
``That was quite an honor,'' she said. ``It was an experience of a lifetime, one of the best experiences of my life.''
But after Colorado Springs, she seriously hurt her back while going off a diving board, severely curtailing her gymnastics activities and quashing her Olympic dreams.
Soon she began to enter pageants.
As a 15-year-old sophomore at Indian River High and a member of its Alpha student service club, Sawyer was invited to participate in the Miss Indian River High Pageant by math teacher and pageant sponsor Dana Creasy, who had heard about her Olympic training.
``Because of the Olympic Training Camp experience she encouraged me to enter,'' Sawyer said. ``I've liked pageants ever since I was a little girl and love to perform. I'm a ham, so it didn't take much convincing.''
Her first attempt turned up no awards, but she kept at it. During her junior and senior years, she won the ``Most Talented'' awards for her rhythmic gymnastics routines and second runner-up awards, but never the top crown.
Sawyer decided to enter the Miss Chesapeake Pageant during her senior year, 1989, making her one of the youngest contestants in that year's competition. She was first runner-up.
The next year, she entered the Miss Chesapeake Pageant again and again took first runner-up. She skipped the 1991 pageant, entered the following year, again winning first runner-up and the swimsuit award. She skipped the 1993 event but decided to try again this year.
It paid off.
``I wanted to win,'' she said. ``I wanted to just do it, to dog it.''
Besides that inspirational tumbling coach, Sawyer also credits her success and persistence to her large, close-knit family - led by her dad, a lieutenant in the Chesapeake Police Department, and her mother, a private-duty nurse.
``Mom and dad have always been there for me, ready to support me and my three brothers and three sisters in anything we wanted to do,'' she said. ``They sacrificed for us.''
With family support, Sawyer said she's been busy with the extensive preparations it takes to be a viable candidate at the Miss Virginia Pageant taking place this weekend.
She's been working out four times a week, taking refresher tumbling courses twice a week and rehearsing her gymnastics routine four to five times a week.
In between, she's been busy rounding up her wardrobe and boning up on current events by carefully reading several newspapers and keeping a close eye on the CNN cable news network.
``The interview part of the pageant counts for 30 percent of the score,'' she said. ``First, you have to give a two-minute presentation standing behind a podium in front of the judges. Then they grill you and ask you anything from your favorite sandwich to questions on politics. You have to know what's going on.''
Sawyer will also talk about her own pet project, the Special Olympics, which she'll use for her pageant platform/community help project.
She said she's ready to face the judges and do as well as she can.
``I want to do my family and city, and coach, proud,'' she said.
Whatever it takes, Beth Sawyer will simply ``dog it'' to win. ILLUSTRATION: Miss Chesapeake, Charlotte Elizabeth ``Beth'' Sawyer, will talk
about her pet project, the Special Olympics, at the Miss Virginia
Pageant in Roanoke.
by CNB