Question by Lise <3: I wanna be a cheerleader for my middle school but i cant do tumbling?
Tryouts are like in a month and I really wanna try out but I can’t do cartwheels and stuff like that. But I am really flexible and I can do splits, heel stretches, leg grabs and scorpions.
and I dont know hot to incorporate my flexibility skills into a cheer. Any help?
Best answer:
Answer by Erin O
Most middle schools don’t require tumbling skills to make the team.
You can incorporate your flexibility into a cheer perhaps by doing a high kick at one point, and ending in the splits?
Good luck!!
Add your own answer in the comments!
Just go out into the yard and try to do cartwheels for an hour
Watch a video online of cheerleaders or gymnasts, find a friend that can do it and watch them. If you try every day for an hour, I guarantee you will learn how to do it. Don;’t ask how many days, just do it.
Most middle schools don’t require tumbling, but its best to be prepared. If you have to do a cheer for tryouts, as someone said, try and incorporate a high kick, drop to splits into it.
Some tips for cartwheels, the way I learned to do a cartwheel is focusing all my energy on one thing at a time until that ONE thing is perfect. Usually takes 10 tries for one thing at a time to be perfect. Then once you have worked on everything, put it all together.
Things to focus on; squeezing your butt, this is so important, probably one of the most important things because it makes your body straight instead of bent at the waist. Locking your knees is very important too, it will make your legs straight, there for making your cartwheel not look messy! HANDS, people have a habit of putting there hands in front of them, but at the side. Not right! This makes your cartwheel go on a slant, doesn’t look too good! You need to put your hands about one or two feet in front of you put directly in a line with your feet, one hand goes with your fingers face the side and the other hand goes down with the fingers facing your other hand. Your hands should make a ‘T’ shape!
After you focus all your energy on each of those things at a time about 10 times until you get it perfect, try it all at once. Get a friend, or relative to video tape you once you think you have it down so you can see what it looks like.
Once you have a perfect cartwheel, try and do a roundoff, they are the same thing except when you feel you are directly above yourself, quickly put your feet together (almost like in a handstand) and pop of your hands to land on your feet together.
Hope I helped, good luck 🙂
Most of the time there’s not a lot of cheers that require flexibility on the floor (as opposed to flyers in the air), although some schools still use splits and walkovers during floor cheers, like this team: http://youtube.com/watch?v=vuuSMmzmjh0 Get into a power tumbling (handsprings etc) class because that’s what most cheer teams use. Even if your middle school doesn’t require it, your high school might so you ought to get started now if you plan on cheering later on.
You can find tumbling drills, exercises, motions, jumps, and stunting tips on this site: http://geocities.com/aescougarcheer/basics.htm
Good luck!