Cheerleading: Timing, control confidence
Cheerleading – at least at the college level – isn’t all about the pom-poms, short skirts and occasional flashy costumes.
If the cheerleaders really want to look good in front of the crowd, it all boils down to timing, muscle control and confidence.
From the most difficult pyramid to throwing girls in the air, making sure everybody gets the timing down is what can make or break a routine.
“Timing and not being afraid,” sophomore cheerleader Marissa Payne said about the most important parts of stunting. “Because if you’re afraid, you’ll get hurt because you won’t do [the stunt] full out.”
One of the most basic aspects of the sport is stunting. It can mean many different things, but the simplest definition of stunting is: a base – generally a guy at the college level – lifts a flyer, who is usually a girl, above their head.
But it is harder than it may look or sound, Payne said.
“First of all, they [the girls] just stand up there and look pretty, which is actually a little bit less than what they’re really doing,” fourth-year Aggie cheerleader Patrick Trounbley said. “They’re actually really tight; they have to control their whole body.”
To do a basic stunt, Trounbley said the base starts standing behind the flyer.
Payne said the base then preps the flyer by saying, “Ready. One. Two.”
At that point, on the third countTrounbley said the flyer starts jumping and the base grabs her waist. As the flyer jumps, he said the guy follows her jump all the way through.
“When you get to the top, you have to flick your wrists up [as the base], and she [the flyer] has to flick her wrists down really hard,” Trounbley said. “That flick is what actually gets that extra little bit to get her to a higher stunting.”
It actually takes a little more than a simple flick of the wrist. Trounbley added that the girl is doing a lot of work pushing herself up.
He said once he gets the girl up, he has to concentrate on balancing. The flyer is controlling her whole body.
“When I’m up … I’m thinking, stay tight, squeeze everything,” Payne said. “Stay tight but stay calm, because if I freak out, then I will do something weird.”
One of the main things the base focuses on is making sure the flyer doesn’t hit the ground, Trounbley said.
No matter how pretty the girl looks in the stunt, or how well she does it, none of it matters if she hits the ground, he said.
At the end of the stunt, Payne said the base calls it off the front and throws the flyer.
Trounbley said on the way down the base breaks the flyer’s fall by catching her around the waist as she is coming down.
-aedmunds@cc.usu.edu
Lift… (Jessica Alexander)
Prep… (Jessica Alexander)