Cheerleading

Cheerleading is a competitive form of stunt and dance routines. It originated from American football teams using girls to cheer them on. Nowadays, it is competitive all over the world, with the world cheerleading championships taking place in America every year.

I joined in 2010 and left in 2016 after a fall resulting in an elbow break. However, in 2017 when the team (luckily for me) fell one person short I went back for one last time.

Competitive cheerleading has been a massive part of my life. It has taught me about teamwork and how everyone is vital to make one thing work. This one thing is then a part of a bigger picture.

The routine I am proudest of can be seen below.

I have competed in lots of categories, including Co-Ed (which means a mix of boys and girls) Level 2, Co-Ed Level 4, All Girl Group-Stunt 5 (video above), Pom-Dance, Cheer-Dance and Street-Cheer. I am so proud of what I managed to achieve in tumbling and stunts.

Cheerleading is clearly something that has lead me to the creative field, especially Pom-Dances like this:

In these sort of routines, timing to the music, positioning and colours are vital.

Below is also a snippet from one of my favourite routines EVER - our Cheer-Dance. Within this pattern there is a partner breakdown, a front and a back partner and 2 rows of this. The front and back do essentially the opposite thing. When this is put in rows it looks so effective. This was one of my favourite ever routines because it was so creative, unique and it just gave everyone the buzz to perform it.

I used to absolutely love cheerleading and aimed to be able to one day compete in worlds. I wish I could go back to Gemini or even join the uni team, but have (really annoyingly) slipped a disc in my spine. The high impact stunts and tumbling I would love to do would probably make it worse.

Thanks for looking back with me!

Katie Xx