“It was a different world,” Sophie recalls, sitting in a quiet Los Angeles coffee shop, far from the rainy Welsh valleys. “We weren’t the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. We were a group of athletic, loud, proud girls from working-class families. Our job was to get the crowd roaring when the boys were getting smashed in the scrum.”
Sophie Dee—born in Cardiff and raised in the small, industrial town of Llanelli—was a cheerleader. sophie dee cheerleader
“People don’t realize how much of cheerleading is about precision and presence,” she explains. “On the sideline, you have to hit your mark, smile through the pain, and make it look effortless. That’s exactly the same skill set I used in my other career. The flexibility helped too,” she adds with a wink. “It was a different world,” Sophie recalls, sitting
“People want to put me in a box,” she says. “Adult star. Glamour model. Whatever. But I was Sophie the cheerleader first. And that girl—the one who learned to fall safely, catch her teammate, and smile while doing it—she’s still the one driving the car.” Our job was to get the crowd roaring
For most fans, that fact is a surprising footnote in a very public career. But for Sophie, the two years she spent as a sideline cheerleader for the Llanelli Rugby Club weren’t just a high school hobby. They were her first taste of discipline, performance, and the electric thrill of a crowd’s energy. In the mid-1990s, cheerleading wasn’t the polished, competitive sport it is in America. In South Wales, it was raw, spirited, and tied directly to the region’s lifeblood: rugby.
The final whistle blew on her cheerleading career a long time ago. But Sophie Dee is still on the squad. She’s just writing her own routine now.
“My coach, Mrs. Evans, was terrifying,” Sophie says with a laugh. “She’d make us hold a leg lift until we shook. She said, ‘If you look bored, the crowd looks bored.’ That stuck with me forever.” Her most vivid memory isn’t a touchdown or a try—it’s the semifinal match against Swansea, the fiercest rival. The stands were packed, the rain was coming down sideways, and the home team was down by five with ten minutes left.