Havre model competition winner moving to career in New York

While his classmates at North Star High School in Rudyard were at their graduation ceremony May 20, Clifford Lenhardt of Havre was on an invitation-only cruise for young and aspiring models, and he will soon be leaving for New York to start a career in that industry.  

He had planned to go into a career as a physical education teacher, but those plans changed after he won the Overall Male Model competition at the Global Stars Network 2017 Invitation-Only Spring Convention on the cruise.

Lenhardt competed in runway, swimwear, photo, improvisation and scene study on the cruise. The participants also had the chance to speak and network with agents and scouts in the talent industry, which has led to a contract for him in New York.

Lenhardt, 18, said he has long been attracted to modeling but has been doing it for less than a year.

"Since I was a kid, I kind of liked modeling," Lenhardt said.

Less than a year ago Lenhardt, who played soccer and hockey while in school, had been planning to go to college first at Montana State University-Northern and then Montana State University in Bozeman, where he planned to study health education in hopes of eventually becoming a gym teacher.

His mother, René Harball, said that last year he took two modeling seminars with the Rocky Mountain Entertainment Agency in Missoula in February, where he learned about what modeling entails. She said It initially started as a part of a career exploration.

Lenhardt said Casey Pobran of Rocky Mountain Entertainment Agency interviewed him, and led to the Global Stars Network invitation.

"And at the end of the two days, they signed him, they offered him an invitation to the cruise," Harball said. "It just was like, fast."

The cruise made three stops in Mexico, Puerto Vallarta, Mazatalan and Cabo San Lucas., Harball said.

Harball said that while Lenhardt was on the cruise, representatives with five modeling agencies wanted to interview him, what is known in the industry as callbacks.

She said she and Lenhardt will temporarily move to New York, where he will have a 30- to 45-day unpaid internship to show him how to do photo shoots and other aspects of modeling. The goal is to have him ready for fall fashion week in late August.

He will then look for modeling assignments while taking online college courses.  

But the possibility of becoming a model didn't always seem so in reach, Harball said, adding that when Lenhardt was looking at possible careers in high school a teacher told him was not being realistic when he said he wanted to become a model.

Modeling is more work than it seems, Lenhardt said.

"I thought it was just you had to stand and get your picture taken but it is a little bit more complicated than that," he said.  

It often involves remaining in positions that are straining to the body, Lenhardt said. Models must maintain or lose weight when needed for an assignment. In one instance, Lenhardt had to do an underwater shoot. To do so he had to blow all the air out of his lungs and hold his breath at the same time to sink. He then had to hold his breath for quite a while just to get the right picture.

Harball said Lenhardt has received a great deal of community support in the form of encouragement as well as donations to help him survive financially while he gets his start in New York. Pizza Hut will also be holding a fundraiser to help Lenhardt with his expenses June 29.

As the date for his departure for the East Coast nears, Lenhardt said, he is worried about adjusting to life in New York "because it is going to be a lot different than small town Montana."