The most impressive thing about Haley Rovner is shockingly not the fact that she’s a computer programer, nor is it that she’s an avid reader and golfer; it’s the fact that she’s in the circus. She’s a Cirque du Soleil bound, professional hula hooper with great passion, talent well beyond her years and a name everyone needs to know.

“It is so much fun being in a circus! Everyone is so talented and wherever we go, people are doing back handsprings down the halls and instead of jumping in elevators, they do handstands against the walls. It is really stressful though, and it’s scary at first but then really fun,” Rovner said.  

She was not born with an innate talent for hooping; ironically, her interest was sparked by the fact that she was not able to hula hoop at all.  With her gripping determination and many hours of practice she taught herself to master this unconventional sport.  

“When I was really little (and very competitive) my friends would have little hooping competitions at birthday parties where I discovered that I was horrible,” Rovner said.  “I decided to practice non-stop so I would beat all of them when I was three and got to the point of being able to keep it up for hours at a time. I entered an endurance competition and won after the judges stopped me at two hours and 45 minutes,” Haley said.

Self-taught, certified as an instructor at age 10, and now a member of the Le PeTiT CiRqUe, a Los Angeles-based circus of kids 18 and under who had the chance to perform in front of the Dalai Lama, Haley has come a long way from backyard birthday parties. She hopes for a future full of hooping but along the way she likes to take moments to pursue her other interests.

“It has always been a dream of mine to get into Cirque du Soleil but I know that it’s a bit of a long shot to say the least,” Rovner said.  “If I don’t go to cirque then I want to be a computer scientist and have been taking coding classes and building computers for a while now,” Haley said.

She’s made the sport her own with special tricks that allow her hooping to take on a life of its own.  “It is much different than what most kids do, commonly people will just do it around their waists and their necks for as long as they can, but I do tricks,” Rovner said.  “I can roll it across my back and do it on my foot and stuff.”  

With major performances and daily practices circus life can take a stressful toll at times, but at the end of the day, there’s nothing she’d rather be doing.  “My favorite part of hula hooping is getting lost in playing around with tricks,” Haley said.  “I also love performing; it makes you feel amazing and getting into makeup and costume makes you feel like a different person.”