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!

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

Game Practices

Well, I tried to post something after last nights practice but forgetful me  forgot my user name and password to my blog. No worries I figured it out again.

Pat left for San Diego last Friday and he wont be back until Thursday so that means that Nicky is running practices this week.

Sundays practice consisted of game practice. I had a ton of fun. Other people not so much. Although it is frustrating to have to relearn game stuff its nice to have a relaxing practice. We combined into two teams for the game there is an All-girl sideline and an coed one.

I am part of the All-girl sideline. I forgot how much our team likes to talk. We had a pretty good practice. One thing that gets me though is how much people don't clue into what is going on. Besides for the guys every girl has cheered before so they have all had to remember routines. How can people no remember where to go for crowd sideline or even time outs. Don't even get me started on pregame. First off one of our sidelines is going to be messed up just get to your spot and worry about it later. That's what us vets are for, you just follow us around until you get the hang of it. That's what I did my freshman year, I followed my vet base partner Silk around like a lost puppy dog. I hope things will be easier when we get to go onto the field Thursday.

After game practice small coed reped elite and team stunt for like 15 minuets.  Our team stunt has been off lately and I don't know what it is. Our elite on the other hand is going very nicely.

Nose update! There is still a little bruise, I do not have a black eye or anything thank Jesus! It should be back to normal by the game!

Thought this was pretty cool! I would probably break myself if I tried to do this now.
 Cheerleader Breaks Handspring World Record