The Bendy Polerina

Hello, Hello, Hello!

Thanks for joining Team Carnie and our group of Misfits as we introduce our Runaways to you in our "Circus Sideshow" series. First up, our resident tattooed pole dancing contortionist, Alicia!

My name is Alicia McKenzie (Alford).

I am 26 years young and live with my husband and our two little fur babies (doggies) in Orlando, FL. I am originally from Illinois and went to college at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago, IL for five years for my architecture degree. I moved down to Florida shortly after I graduated to begin my career.

By day, I am a full-time architectural designer and B.I.M. (Building Information Modeling Coordinator) at a 50-person firm with offices all over the world. At night and weekends, I train and explore my passion for contortion, the aerial arts, and strength training. I was first introduced to aerial arts when I purchased a Groupon out of curiosity for pole dancing classes at Foxy Fitness back in December 2015. I had minimal dancing experience prior and did some gymnastics classes when I was very young. From there, I instantly fell in love with pole; pole has become my gate-way to other aerial arts, thus, pole will always hold a special place in my heart.

A few months later, I began taking flexibility classes at Foxy Fitness; I was nowhere near close to having flat splits and I had no idea that my back was naturally flexible until then. I became obsessed with flexibility training and not only went to lots of classes and yoga, I also stretched at home as well. I progressed quickly and got my splits flat on both sides, and really started exploring different ways to back bend and taught myself how to do chin stands.

About a year or so later, one of my aerial teachers was hosting a master lyra class at Team Carnie’s location. I was very excited about it and signed up. After that class, both my aerial and contortion journey completely changed – and for the better!

I learned that Team Carnie offers actual contortion classes as well as amazing aerial classes that take place in over 20ft ceilings!

Since then, I would drive out every Tuesday evening (about a 45 min drive) just to attend these classes taught by amazing Coach Zach and hone my skills and be a part of an amazing circus family.

Even though Zach may be a tough coach at times, he is truly amazing, extremely knowledgeable, and pushes his students to learn and do their best. I have seen the most progress in my skills training with him more so than anyone else I have trained with.

I am very proud to be a part of Team Carnie. My hopes for the future is to be able to compete and perform soon in lyra, pole, and contortion acts.

Alicia has been one of the Misfits since our masterclass with Nicole Sirdoreous in summer 2017. She specializes in Contortion and Lyra, and as you can see from her photos, she is incredibly talented at what she does. Outside of her circus training, Alicia does modeling and fitness training. If you would like to see some of her beautiful photoshoots follow her on social media! She often posts shoots from her most recent modeling shoots, and always shows of her circus skills.

Find her on Instagram as @aliciacourtneya give her a follow and go look through her page. She's truly talented, and we are thrilled to have her on the Island of Misfit Toys.

If you like what you see, and you want to help Alicia train by sponsoring her as a TCP athlete, click the link here to go to our Patreon page. Patreon is a way that fans and supporters like you can donate and financially support artists in their journey. ALL of our Patreon funds go towards the students training, and equipment. We want to offer as much as we can to Alicia and our other Misfits, but circus can be very expensive. Make sure to check out the link to see how you can help Alicia reach her circus goals!

If you'd like to donate to our program as a whole, helping us get new equipment and our new location, make sure to check out our Gofundme page and donate there! Every little bit helps, so make sure you share the link with all your friends, and donate if you're able!