Don’t flip out: cheer is a sport

LETS GO WARRIORS! LETS GO! Do you cheer at football or basketball games? Well I don’t mean a fan in the stand type of cheer. Do you cheer for a cheer team on the sidelines? Well I do and have for eight years.

After interviewing fithteen random boys and girls in Woodbridge Middle.  I’ve found out that one boy in 7th grade has cheered before and four other girls have cheered.

Mr. Harris, the vice principal at WMS, said he never cheered, but believes it is “definitely” a sport. He went on to explain that cheer is “something you can go to college and get a scholarship for and even make it as big as a professional is a sport.”

Another WMS faculty member, Mrs.Gallagher, says she cheered when she was seven and finished her years as a senior cheerleader in high school. She thinks cheer is “definitely a sport” and “the worst injuries come from cheer”.  That is an astonishing response because she’s played softball her entire life and the injuries still were never as bad as cheerleading.

A sixth grade girl named Morgan has never cheered and said her opinion on cheer being a sport is “no, because it’s just not”.  She doesn’t think it’s a sport and wouldn’t join because it’s “boring”. She states “Basketball is a sport. Everyone can cheer, but everyone can’t play basketball”. I disagree with this opinion because for basketball you have to tryout and it’s the same concept for All-Star cheerleading.

A few other teachers at WMS weighed in.  Mr.Thomsen, the physical education teacher, and Mrs.Lukachyk, the health teacher, both say cheer is a sport for many different reasons. A few reasons they named were “teamwork, athletic abilities/physical activity, choreography, and there are teams for cheer everywhere.”

And Mr. Thomsen says, ”any guy that does it should not get made fun of. It’s one of the hardest sports out there.” Mrs.Lukachyk says “football and basketball players have plays while cheerleaders have a choreographed routine that has to remembered.”

Flipping and throwing people in the air is no joke. It takes time and effort just like any other sport. Many think cheer is just a “shaking pom pom activity”. It’s way more than that. I’m actually a flyer and it takes a lot of trust to let anyone just throw you in the air to complete a new stunt. Besides all the injuries doing cool tricks in the air; cheer is just a boisterous sport. Injuries aren’t fun, but they can come from anywhere. Running a three minute routine over and over again while saying a cheer and tumbling through one minute and thirty seconds of a routine can be exhausting. I can’t wait for cheer season to come  back and do it all over again.