What motivates me.

Remembering all the hard work that I had to put in to be a part of this team and the journey of a life time. All the times I had to sit and watch people live out my dream last year knowing that if I put in the work I could have the chance of going to nationals and having no other option than to be put on this team is what motivates me.

Coming in to each and every practice knowing that there is someone who was me last year, someone who would give anything to be out on the mat and in my place motivates me.

Knowing that throughout all the ups and downs of the journey I've had the most amazing support group to pick not only me up but to keep the team chemistry where it should be motivates me.

Being part of a team that works hard each and every day to continuously get better and who never gets complacent motivates me.

Having the ability to go out on the the mat each time and trust every person out their will try to be the best they can be motivates me.

Looking at each and every person on this team and knowing they have had some sort of physical and/or emotional struggle they have had to overcome to be here motivates me.

Proving to Pat time and time again that we are the best team he could have put together, accepting and demolishing ever challenge he has faced us with motivates me.

Lastly, knowing that if we go down to nationals and perform the way we run we will get what we rightfully deserve motivates me.

I'm Back!

Sorry for the delay! I had some doubts as to whether I should continue writing my blog or not. With much deliberation and though put into it, I have decided to continue to write. We have much to catch up on since my last post!

Last Friday night was one of our first performance as a team. It was at Homecoming's Rock Rally. We first went to the IAC to warm everything up, we over estimated how much time it would take. We were done in no more than 20 minuets, this left us with a little less than an hour before show time.

The waiting game was our next battle we had to occupy our time in the tiny crowded hallway next to Plachta Auditorium. Thank the lord for the invention of smart phones. I'm not going to lie i spent the majority of the time defending the reasons I wanted to buy my tree. Its this Halloween tree from Target, its all black and sparkly. I really don't know why I want it but I'm in love with it.

Finally it was time to move to the back of the auditorium and wait even more. The band and the football team were on before us and watching them really got me excited.

It was our turn. The MC gave us a nice introduction and we were on. I honestly forgot how much I miss performing. The nervous jitters easing away to the excitement of hitting a routine. We nailed our routing, getting off the stage everyone was all smiles. Looking around I realized I can't wait for all of us to be down in Florida and doing our routine.

Now onto Saturday.

Saturday was our Homecoming game. Small was able to cheer the parade. I was all cute with my hair looking good and everything. Then the weather decided to be muggy and poof! there goes my perfectly straight hair. Oh well, the parade was a ton of fun anyway. A picture of us cheering even ended up on Central's Homepage!

After a group of us went to Lil' Chef and ate some breakfast. I stuffed my face...and then some. We were exempt from walk of champions, so when we went to the IAC we got to lay around and let our stomachs settle.

Once the rest of Small showed up we warmed up portions of our routine and showed off to the Alumni. It was super cool hearing all of the positive feedback from them. The ooh's and Ahh's that went along with each element were even better!

Once the rest of the team got back from we warmed up for the game. Then we went out to tailgate. My parents showed up five minuets before we had to go onto the field. I wish I was able to spend more time with them. I haven't been able to go home in over a month. I'm just a little bit homesick. Nothing the game couldn't fix!

The game great! We had a great time, Alumni is allowed to cheer the game, it was funny watching them fool around on the sidelines.

As you can see the alumni were not the only ones having a great time!

Sunday's practice.

Since it was about a week ago and we have had two other practices since then I don't remember much so here is what I can recall.

We learned an alternative team stunt, which consumed a mass majority of our time. We also took time to work on the elite.

We worked on Delgado's side of the pyramids they made a ton of improvements.

With a half hour left we moved the mats over and worked on cleaning up our tumbling. While working on our tumbling we were running different elements of our routine.

I ran the entire first part of our routine. One third of our routine! I was beyond thrilled, we actually did a little more than a third because we did run a few other elements but that was besides the point. I can't believe that its only October and I ran a third of our routine. I don't think anyone realized how excited I was.

Wednesday's practice.

Wednesday was also the two year anniversary of my Oda's passing. To have practice on this day kind of felt like a blessing. All day I thought about him and how proud he would be of me and my sisters. He has two granddaughters competing in D1 athletics at the collegiate level. One of his favorite things to do was come and watch me cheer. Knowing how far I've come from making my 7th grade cheer team to having the opportunity to go down to UCA Nationals I know he is looking down on me with pride.

Wednesday we had a theme practice. It was 80s theme! Needless to say we looked great.

 

 

The majority of this practice was spent on pyramids. We had a former cheerleader come in and help us with our elements. We mostly worked on cheer pyramid. Although it was a bit rough for everyone I believe that we made some great strides.

 

Delgado's side of first pyramid also got a full out hit, which is super good! I still can't believe that its only October and were so far into our journey.

 

We worked a little bit on team stunt and elite. Team stunt is frustrating me. I know that as a team we could hit the elite elements in it, but it may not be clean. Its mostly a personal thing. I want to be able to do an elite stunt on the mat. Maybe with the fire lit under our butts we will be able to.

 

Not going to lie that's about all I really remember from Wednesday's practice.

 

Thursday's Practice.

 

The first part of practice was game practice. It went well, we have another game verses Akron on Saturday. All girl had 24 girls throw standing tucks! It is a new record in CMU cheer history! That was super exciting.

 

After that bit, we divided into our Young Champion groups. I am a little bitter sweet about this clinic, just because it is my older sister, Audrey, Big Ten Cross Country Race, and my entire family is going. Not just parents but extended family and like I said earlier I am a little homesick. But I do enjoy working Young Champions! I get to private coach pretty much all day, I love private coaching because you actually get to work one on one with a team and I love putting together stunts! This clinic will also be our biggest one in our history!

 

At smalls practice we had about 25 minuets to work through our elements. We again switched team stunt, and got a new back up. The more I think about this, the more I agree with it. It will be a lot cleaner. Then we worked pyramids for the last bit. Our side of the pyramid had a pretty close to perfect hit, it was beautiful  not going to lie.

 

Sorry about the delay again! And for such little detail, I'm in a rush to get to the football game! FIRE UP CHIPS!

 

ps. I will start bio's on my next blog! Ran out of time!



Time Crunch

Today we started practice an hour later than usual because the Tigers were on. No, I am not lying. My coach postponed practice a full hour because of a baseball game...but to be completely honest, no one was complaining. Good news is they won!

The majority of our practice was a game practice. This weekend is homecoming, needless to say all of us vets are super excited. This game practice was much more laid back than usual. We didn't have to go out on the field which was a relief because it was raining all day. We had to practice in our warm ups and some of the new people are not used to it. I will admit the new warm ups we have are a tad more difficult to move in than the old ones.

Everything went decent, nothing amazing. It wasn't like we were switching around anything. Once we broke into two teams we worked on our individual skill set. Again nothing too exciting. All-girl has sweet new pyramids. Its exciting to know that everyone is still progressing. Not that I think they wouldn't without a handful of vets. The vets on the team are good leaders and are taking the team in the right direction.

After the game material, coed and all-girl broke out and left. At this point Small moved onto our nationals elements. Pat addressed the team and let us know that we have about 25 minuets to test out of all the elements. We were racing the clock.

We started off with tumbling. Easy as pie. Then moved onto the elite, all-girl did good, we still need to work on timing. Coed made some great strides today each group did the elite dismount. Already an improvement and we were only ten minuets into our practice.

Next was first pyramid. Our side did one rep, it was a hit, so the majority of the time was spent on the other side. Again more improvement.

Now onto the cheer pyramid. Jessy's side ran full out, the first two were shaky. We moved to our side. Pat gave us a little pep talk, and we hit it! It was not pretty by all means but a hit is a hit. After Jessy's side also got a hit and we moved on.

The last thing we worked on was team stunt. My group did good. We just need to spend time on cleaning it up. Its one thing to hit it, its another thing to hit it clean. I think it will get better with reps.

We got out of practice a little bit late. But within the half hour that we had time to work we were able to improve and that is one of the main focuses of this point in our journey.

Starting Sunday I am adding a new segment to my blog. Meet the team! At the bottom of each post I will write a short bio and provide a picture of a different member of my team.

I was searching CMU Cheerleading on the Internet and I found this. Old CMU Cheer Website Enjoy!

Time to Move On

Before practice today I went into the IAC early and helped tape Jessy and Carter's partner stunting routine. I left to go pick up Adam from his class because I am such a good friend and it was raining.

I'm not going to lie I was a bit nervous for how it was going to go. Carter posted on our facebook wall asking for everyone to show up a bit early for practice so that we could talk.

As soon as the majority of the team arrived, Carter brought us all together Pretty much  told us that we could either continue to be angry or we can not dwell on it and move forward.

We started off with a a full out mark and then jumped right into running elements. Middle layers and basket timers were added first. Then we had some time to warm up our tumbling.

We took a longer time to work on tumbling. We worked on timing in our spring tucks and running tumbling. We also worked on cleaning it up. After we added full out tumbling into our running.

Next part of practice we moved onto pyramids. First we worked on first pyramid. The first attempt we made we had a hit. Its relieving to know we have our first pyramid. The other side made some good strides too. Gera and Pep are getting better at holding the pyramid. Like I have mentioned before me and Pep don't have back spots so its just us and our fliers...and then the flier on top of them. Moral of the story we have to be machines.

Cheer pyramid was next. Jessy's side went first. Their first run was great! Our side... not so much. For some reason everything was just off for us. We attempted a few more attempts Pat brought the team in. Our practice was not like last Sunday. We had no passion in everything we were doing. We were just going through the motions and that is not enough for what we have to do. Another thing we weren't having fun; On Sunday's practice we got everything done and had a ton of fun doing it.

LA had an idea...it was to make the girls go stand in one area and the boys go stand in another. I still don't understand why he did that...I don't think anyone else does either.

We moved onto team stunt next. Our reps have gotten significantly better. Especially our dismount at the end. Everyone is progressing in the elite too. We didn't spend much time working on them this practice.

I can't wait till after we compete and I can post the video on here so that people actually know what I'm talking about. I know that if I was reading this I would be super confused. I am sorry for this inconvenience, we are competing so the less people know the better. We don't want people stealing our routine...like in bring it on.

Friday we are preforming at Mockrock so the last hour of practice we put together a routine. We will be on at 7:20pm in Plachta Auditorium.  We will be doing some elements from our routine and this is our first performance as a team!

We all have the same goal in mind and before we can reach that we need to act like a team again. We need to have practice like on Sunday were we got things done but had a great time doing it. Just like our routine our chemistry is a work in progress, and we have proved time and time again that when situations get us down we are there to pick each other back up.

Captain Carter to the Rescue

Carter lead our practice.

We started off warming up the elite sequence. Elite for my group is easier than team stunt. So after we warmed up that twice we switched to  team stunt. I finally figured out why our full ups were going so bad. Me and Gera were so used to hitting them at the top that we forgot one important part of All-girl full-up technique. Absorbing. As soon as we figured out our full-ups were significantly better.

After a few more reps of the elite and team stunt we repd them as a team. We started with team stunt, we did it side by side. We hit each time which was a sweet relief. Then we obviously moved onto elite. All-girl elite was a little off so we took some time to fix the timing on stuff. It was nice to take time out to fix some of the small stuff.

When we hit a decent number of reps we moved onto the cheer. The few times we reped the pyramid at the game, we just did the first part of it, it didn't go as well as it could have, so I'm not going to lie I was a little bit nervous. Carter and Jessy's side went full out first and it was a perfect rep. Next our side went full out and we hit our first rep too! It was rough but its a hit, but a hit none the less. Carter's side had more good reps. Our side had a few more good reps we decided to add our sign into the mix. And it went pretty good the first rep, the next few reps were not so good, we were attempting to save all the reps which is a good progression. Finally we had a pretty close to perfect rep and it was a good feeling knowing that even with all the outside factors that were affecting our practice today we can still come in and get productive things done.

We then had to work on our first pyramid. Our side had a good rep the first one, there are still some things that we need to improve on but we made some great strides. By the end of working on it, we were running from the section before it. The other side also made some great progress, they finally ran it full out, the only element they have not done is the elite dismount.

After we did probably every ones least favorite thing, baskets. Today was a little rough for all-girl. Sander finally threw the first part of her elite basket, she did great! Our basket on the other hand was a little off today. I honestly think we just need to get more reps on them. Jaclyn was able to throw, one of her elite baskets. So we actually had a pretty decent basket day. I guess just disregard my first comment about them going badly. Although at one point I  got knocked in the mouth and I thought for a second my fake tooth fell out. Don't worry I'm not a hillbilly its still there. Thank the Lord.

One of the last things we did was tumble. At this point in time I was extremely grateful that Carter was running our practice. We started with the tumbling in our cheer, then we made our way to mine and Gera's favorite part, spring tucks. Thank God we were pretty much just testing out of our reps. We did two reps and moved on. Then we went to running tumbling, Me and Molly went together and we had perfect timing. The rest of the tumblers went, and we did some reps with the elite tumblers and the not so elite tumblers. For tucks we got to do one of my favorite things, tuck circle. The goal for everyone was to stick their landing. I killed it.

The last part of our practice we were supposed to rep team stunt more, but everyone who was working on elite tumbling skills had to go over and work with Scotty. So we were left with the boys and like a hand full of us girls. Jessy was one of the leftovers and SHE ASKED to stunt on all girl. Obviously we started stunting. The look on Carters face was priceless when he saw her stunting with us. We started off with just some basic stunts then we tried a rewind. The ones we did were great, then we tried it to an elevator just for fun and it hit. Jasmin and me freaked out it was crazy how perfect it was. Jasmin literal could not talk it was hilarious. Here is the video of our success.

 

 

We ended practice with a full out mark as always. Put away the mats and broke out. I think today's practice went great. With Pat leaving, we could have easily had a very unproductive practice but instead we were blessed with a fantastic leader on this team. Carter took charge of our practice and we progressed in every element we did. As a team this says a lot. We have had so many different obstacles that are out of our control affecting our every move as a team. The fact that we stuck together, listened to Carter and had a very productive practice shows that we are on the right path of the journey. That being said I think I speak for everyone on our team in saying thank you to Carter for stepping up and helping us out at today's practice.

 

 

Carter just mentioned to me that he is the second best tumbler on small coed. I disagree, I think Jimmy is, Carter has not thrown a sanding tuck since February and Jimmy threw his like a month ago. So at our next practice, Carter and Jimmy are going to have a tumble off...consisting of cartwheels and round offs.

Games on Games on Games

Thursday I was blessed. God really is looking out for me on this journey. Instead of going to practice, Pat forgot about a volleyball game, so the All-girl small coed stunt groups got to cheer the game! At Thursdays practice everyone else had to bundle up and hit the field for another game practice.

I was game captain of the volleyball game. Not going to lie I have not cheered a volleyball game in two years. I was a bit nervous, it all ended up okay. I was cheering with all vets and Gera. Earlier in the day Pat got in contact with me to tell everyone we had to cheer and Gera thought it was just going to be us two cheering. When she told me this I nearly lost it. Think of how ridiculous that would look, only two cheerleaders cheering on the sideline of a large arena.

The game went great! I love cheering volleyball, our team kicks some ass, no lie. After the game we ran over to practice, they were already back inside.

We got back just in time for tuck circle. Tuck circle is when everyone forms a circle and each person has the opportunity to go into the middle of the circle and do their back tuck and spring tuck. Opportunity, ha no you don't have an option if you go into the circle or not. It's a way to test out of tumbling without having a ton of pressure on you.

All-girl and Coed left after that and Small stayed and practiced. We just ran through our routine elements.

Starting with a full out mark, I don't think All-girl was ready for testing out of EVERYTHING. This included tumbling. If you couldn't tell already, for many of us tumbling is one of our least favorite things to do. Be on the bottom of a pyramid? Heck yeah no problem! Throw a spring tuck? SWEATING!!!

We started off with tumbling and it went bad. I didn't really understand that he wanted us to go full out, as in move to our spots and what not, so we did our opening tumbling and then froze just before our standing. He was not too pleased about that. I think he could have been a bit clearer.

After tumbling we went to our elite stunt. For my group we are more consistent with our elite stunt than we are with team. Ironic right?

We then moved onto the cheer pyramid. Both sides hit and we moved on. First pyramid was next. The first rep on our side was shaky. Then Pat went and gave a pep talk to the other side. We waited patiently as he was talking smack about us. We just let the haters be our motivators.

The other side did the pyramid full out! It was really exciting. Our side went and we hit our rep. It pumps me up knowing that we are improving and getting closer to our goal.

Team stunt was next. My group was decent. Its a work in progress. Everyone else did good though.

The whole hour we practiced was productive.

Last night was our first game in a month. I was so happy to get back on the field. This was also the first game that Nicky was in charge of. He did a great job! I had a ton of fun at the game.

Games are games, I always have the time of my life in front of the crowd. Even though we lost, our team did great. Me and Bri were doing some pretty ridiculous stuff on the field such as making up cheers, having yelling contests, and jumping contests. Also at one point we were in a stunt on the field and Bri decided she was going to dance while we were holding her. It was absolutely hilarious. Nothing too exciting happened yesterday, we hit our stunts and tumbling and just spent the whole game trying to stay warm.

Here is a recap of last nights game. CMU V NAVY

One Step at a Time

Last nights practice was run by Nicky. In my opinion it was one of our better practices since switching around the routine.

The way he ran it we did everything for a limited amount of time with a reasonable amount of repetitions. We started off with our elite sequence. We took 15 minuets to warm up then we would ran it. My group is killing the elite! Its funny because this is the part that should be hard but I guess the elements the All-girl groups are doing are pretty basic.

The next thing we worked on was the cheer. I'm not going to lie I was pretty nervous about doing the cheer pyramid again. Even though I did it after I got my bloody nose, I was just a little nervous. I think I had a right to be, I caught the girls with my face for Gods sake. They pyramid went really well! Our side is working especially hard to save every rep. I feel like the more we get into the habit of that, we wont have to worry about saving it, we will just be hitting it. Jessy's side was looking great too, with multiple full out hits.

We then moved onto team stunt. The last time we worked on team stunt it was pretty bad. I know everyone in my group wanted to do better and we did. We only dropped one, which is pretty good stats. As we were reping team stunt, Pat showed up. I think this made everyone a little more tense than they were with Nicky. But even with Pat there we did good.

After team stunt we worked on first pyramid. We did middle layers like twice then our side ran full out. The first one was decent, being as we hadn't done it full out in over a week. The second one something was off in a part so the counts stopped and we popped down on one instead of five. I know it doesn't sound like a big deal but if we were to do that in a routine it would be totally off. Then again our counts wouldn't be off in a routine. Carter sassed at us because of that, I was just glad that me and molly were on the same page because it could have been 100 times worse if one of us popped down and one didn't. But other than that our side of the pyramid is going smoothly.

Delgado's side of the pyramid made some great strides also. They just have to add two more elements into it to run it full out. I was very proud of Pep. Me and her don't have back spots during this pyramid and she is holding her ground like a champ!

The last portion of practice we worked on baskets. I love that Bri is not afraid to go for anything. We had to start with the basics to get her used to being back on All-girl, but I really think that being on coed for that little amount of time helped both her and Alyssa on their baskets. They at least feel a ton better. We got to the first part of our elite basket which was pretty cool.

Overall the practice went good. Although at one point I felt as though everyone was stressed you would have never been able to tell based on the performance we were giving.

At the end of practice Pat mentioned how happy he was to come into practice to a full out hit to team stunt. I know I really didn't see our progress in the elements, so it was a breath of fresh air to hear Pat tell us how well we are doing.

Nicky did a great job with handling us. I like the way we got to work on everything in a timely matter, practice seemed to go by faster than usually. It felt productive. Game on Friday versus Navy,  as much as I love doing nationals stuff, I can't wait to be out on the field again!

 

Top Gun All Stars do not compete against us, but just like HPU they are a fantastic team. They also put on a ridiculously cool routine and have won worlds multiple times.