PUEBLO – It’s a bronze medal for the Bayfield Marching Wolverines.

Coming into state marching band competition ranked third, then taking third in semi-finals on Monday morning, it wasn’t a huge surprise, albeit a bit of a disappointment for the perfection-seeking musicians, who were hoping to move up in the final rankings.

They were rightfully proud of their accomplishments, however, and said they played their best. “We have the most support at state, and that’s the most important thing for us,” said Savannah Kaufmann, a sophomore percussionist for the band. “It was our best performance this year.”

Bayfield’s 68-member band is huge by state 1A competition standards, which is for schools with up to 400 students. First place Estes Park and second place Cedaredge have only about 20 or so members in their bands. So when all of the Wolverine parents show up to support their kids, it’s a sizeable section of fans in the stands cheering for Bayfield.

Bayfield scored 60.9 points, just behind Cedaredge with 62.2 and Estes Park with 64.2.

Even getting to the Colorado Bandmasters Association finals competition is grueling. There are five regional competitions, and only the top bands in each class in each region advance to state.

On Oct. 15, Bayfield took second at the Western Marching Qualifier in Grand Junction, just behind Cedaredge, to move on to the finals at Colorado State University-Pueblo on Oct. 26. In between, the band played at the Zia Marching Festival in Albuquerque on Oct. 24.

All of the bands performing at regionals and state are judged on music individual, music ensemble, two categories of music effects, visual individual, visual ensemble and visual effect.

“It’s more pressure,” Kauffman said of performing at state.

The only other finalist from Southwest Colorado was Montezuma-Cortez High School, which took fourth in 2A competition for schools with 401-850 students. Durango High School was seventh in class 3A, for schools with 851 to 1,200 students.