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E-mail This StoryThere is a first time for everything, but most people don’t get as lucky trying something for their fist time as Sydney Capello did.
The 15-year-old from Southlake decided to compete in beauty pageants this year. She won the Teen Miss Texas and will now go onto the national Miss America’s Outstanding Teen competition in Orlando, FLA. later this month.
“My cousin had always done it (pageants) when I was younger; I always watched her, and when I got older I thought it would be fun,” said Sydney.
Sydney decided she wanted to start competing in pageants last summer. She won the title of Miss Teen Duncanville last October. She competed in the Miss Teen Duncanville pageant because her cousin is the director of the Southlake chapter and it was against the Miss America rules for her to compete in Southlake.
After the Duncanville competition Sydney moved on to Miss Teen Texas in July and she also won.
The pageants are broken down into different areas that are judged including aerobic wear, evening gowns, talent, interview and stage question.
Sydney’s talent is vocal. At the Miss Teen Duncanville she sang Blackhorse in the Cherry Tree, at the Miss Teen Texas she sang Midnight Train to Georgia and at the competition in Orlando she will sing God Loves the Child. Sydney takes vocal lessons three to four times a week to help perfect her voice and get ready for the competition.
Besides vocal lessons, she has lots to do in order to prepare Miss America’s Outstanding Teen. She also does mock interviews, goes to a personal trainer and stays up on current events. She works out five times a week.
“In aerobic wear they don’t want you to be skinny, they want to see muscles and someone who lives a healthy lifestyle,” Sydney said. “For physical fitness, I wanted to win because I actually have to watch what I eat and work out.”
In each of the parts of competition the girls have a chance to win scholarship money toward college. Since starting the process last fall, Sydney has won more than $5,000 in scholarship money. In the Miss Teen Texas, she won photogenic, preliminary fitness, overall fitness, overall evening gown and Miss Teen Texas. Sydney said another reason she wanted to get into pageants was because she could win scholarship money for college.
She will have the chance to win more scholarship money in Orlando.
“I will be there for 11 days and no trip to Disney World,” Sydney said.
Her 11 days will be spent at rehearsals, but the trip won’t be all work. She explained that the contestants will have a chance to go to Medieval times, several luncheons, and get a makeover, but the catch is no contact with family for most of the trip. The girls will be rooming with contestants from other states, and will only be allowed 3 visitations days that will start on preliminary night.
The contest in Orlando will be broken up into preliminary days where all the contestants compete in all aspects of the competition. After that 10 finalists will be named and they have the competition again, from there the top five will place.
No matter what happens in Orlando Sydney will have plenty to keep her busy.
“I come back here (to Southlake) and they have appearances lined up for me and it could be anything from a parade to speaking to a school about my platform: Be better not bitter; overcoming adversity,” Sydney said.
She feels her platform affects everyone and is about how people deal with situations.
In addition to her competitions Sydney has been involved with volunteering since she was young and performed more than 3,000 community service hours. She is involved with Girls for life, God’s Country Kids, Church on the Slab and Little Hands Big Hearts.
“I love down time, but it’s good to be going, going, going,” Sydney said. “I love doing this and have met so many great people.”
Sydney said she met her best friend Reilly at competition. The two even fell asleep back stage at a rehearsal. Riley lives in Plano and is Miss Teen Metro Crest.
Sydney feels like she has learned things from this experience, such as tact, that will help her later in life.
Sydney is the youngest of five siblings and will be taking 11 family members and friends to visitation days in Orlando. She gives a lot of credit to her big sister, Melissa, for helping her stay organized through all of this.
Sydney one day wants to be an emergency medicine doctor and plans to apply to TCU for her pre-med.
