by Dana Burkey
“What if we don’t win any more this season?” I finally asked. “What if we make fools of ourselves?”
“Not possible,” he assured me. “You guys started the season strong and people will remember that. The routine was easier then, but it got you a wild card bid to Summit and that’s what matters. Some teams work all season and don’t get to go to Summit at all.”
“But we might go to Summit and be the worst team there,” I tried again.
“Then out of all the top teams you're not the best,” he shrugged. “You ladies are still good and you prove that every time you hit the mat. The changes Nicole made to the routine are hard for your level, and getting them to hit will take time. But you have three weeks after this weekend to clean it all up. It’s plenty of time to work out all the stumbling blocks.”
“I guess,” I said with a sigh.
“I never thought I would see this day,” my dad laughed. When I gave him a confused look he continued. “Here’s my little Max, stressing about whether or not she will be the best cheerleader in the land.”
“Funny, Dad,” I said with a smile despite trying to keep it in. “I’m just an athlete trying to do my best.”
“And you’ll do your best,” he said earnestly. “But for right now you need to do your best while still staying positive even if some of the girls around you are still learning and trying. One of these days you might be on a team where you’re the low man on the totem pole and it won’t feel very nice if someone is less than encouraging just because they are better than you at a tick tick or a heel pull.”
“Tick tock and heel stretch,” I corrected him, knowing he had messed up on purpose. “And who said I’m even going to do cheer after this year?”
“You might not,” he said around a bite of ice cream. “But if you decide to leave that gym I know you’ll miss it too much to stay gone for long.”
I didn’t say it, but I knew he was kind of right. Lexi and Halley were my best friends other than Peter and Kyle. After helping me through fitting in at the gym when I was new and felt like I would never have things in common with the other kids there, I knew they were going to be friends of mine forever, just like our new cheer bows said. But, at the same time, the idea of failing at a big competition like Summit was not exactly appealing. It was the biggest competition a level 3 team like Blast could make it to, so even getting invited was a big deal. All of that wouldn’t matter much, however, if we got there and couldn’t keep stunts in the air enough to even make it to day two, let alone the final round. I tried to push the stress of that thought to the back of my mind and instead focus all my energy on the quickly melting sundae in front of me.
I was thankful for a few days off of Blast practice but was still back in the gym Tuesday evening for my extra skills class. The class was usually held on Fridays, but when we had competitions on the weekend, the class was moved around so we didn’t get overworked or even hurt the day before competing. I hadn’t always been a part of the class, but once the school year started, I was asked to join Greg and a group of athletes for the extra practice after I had stopped attending my initial tumbling class. It gave me a chance to try harder tumbling, work on flying, and also help some of the guys at the gym work on lifting me up and holding me in the air. Walking into the large open space, I tossed my bag into a cubby by the first of four blue mats that ran the length of the room. There was a wall of mirrors that ran the length of the far wall, although I knew we wouldn’t use them much during our class. Facial expressions and spacing were the last things on our mind during our skills class.
I gave my dad a quick wave as he walked into the parent viewing area and started instantly talking to someone he knew. There was only a dozen or so adults in the room at the moment, although more would be arriving for team practices soon. Parents were allowed in the gym only if they were inside the viewing room, almost like a little parent zoo for us athletes to look at from time to time. When I asked TJ, one of the gym owners, about it once, he told me, “Cheer moms can be mean and nasty when they get right down to it.” I didn’t really know what that meant, but after a whole season of competitions where I would watch the way some moms talked to their children as well as the coaches, I was thankful for the viewing room. I was also extra thankful for my dad. Sure, it was a bummer my mom wasn’t around to see me following in her footsteps with cheerleading, but having my dad cheer me on without ever stressing me out was a real big plus!
Walking closer to Greg, I sat down and started stretching. Greg was a good bit older than me, having already aged out of the TNT gym once he graduated high school. Not to mention he also finished four years cheering in college before he began coaching at the gym. But, even being ‘old’ compared to me and a lot of the athletes at TNT, Greg was still in great shape. He was around 6 feet tall and well-built from his years of holding fliers in the air. He had short black hair and a layer of black stubble on his face and grayish-blue eyes that when combined with his height and muscles could be a little intimidating, to say the least. Thankfully, after working alongside him for so long on my tumbling, he was like a big brother I was glad to be around. Even when we had to work hard on something, he made it fun for everyone, all while pushing us to really reach our potential.
“So, what are we working on tonight?” I asked him as I started doing some of the harder stretches that would get me ready for the skills I was about to perform.
“I want you to work on getting more height on that kick full,” Greg said with a determined look on his face. “You’re not quite high enough off the ground without the air mat to get the second rotation, but I think you’re not too far from it.”
“What about her standing double full?” someone said, walking over to join us. “When are we going to see her land that?”
“Soon enough,” I assured Connor once he sat down in my field of vision. I was bent pretty far backward while in a split so I could stretch my back and arms, so until he took a seat I wasn’t quite sure who had been talking.
“I think you’re going to get it before I do,” he said with a smile.
“Fingers crossed,” I nodded, knowing our back and forth banter was all in fun.
Connor was, after all, my best guy friend in the gym. He was the first person I got to know other than Halley and Lexi, and was just as close to me as Peter and Kyle, even though I hadn’t known him nearly as long. Connor was only two years older than me, but he was a lot taller and stronger than most 15-year old’s I knew. This was likely because, much like Greg, he spent a lot of time lifting fliers into the air for stunts while at the gym. Also, like Greg, he had dark brown hair, although Connor’s tended to curl as it got longer. When I first met him his hair was a little longer so the curl was easy to see, but once competition season started he cut his hair shorter with just a little bit of a spiked up section in the front, which only helped to draw attention to his dark green eyes. The main thing people noticed when they looked at Connor, however, were his dimples. He always seemed to be smiling, and when he did, his dimples were all you could focus on. Before I met him I had always thought my dimples were noticeable, but standing next to Connor, mine were all but nonexistent.
“Okay, time to get started,” Greg announced after Matthew, Reid, and Gwen all arrived. “Let’s start with some basic stunts.”
The one thing that was a little exhausting about my skills class was that I was the only flier, surrounded by athletes much taller and stronger than I was. Sure, we were all there to work on our tumbling with Greg as well, since he was the gym’s head tumbling coach, but everyone besides me was there to work on basing. That meant that I was constantly up in the air working on new skills or holding poses I had already mastered in my time on Blast. I would hold an arabesque or a scorpion, or even try to hold one leg as flat as possible to my back in a position known as a needle, which was a newer move for me. As soon as I held the move for another count or so, I would be brought down to the mat. Then, I would be picked up once again to try t
he move with a new person or group of people lifting me. It helped them that I was the smallest 13-year-old at the gym by at least 6 inches and easily 15 pounds. I used to complain that I was still well under 5 feet tall, but my time at cheerleading was helping me to embrace it more and more. After all, thanks to my small frame, the other athletes in my stunt class could lift and toss me effortlessly, all while I got to work on my flying skills in the air. The practice allowed me to get used to smaller stunt groups and even one-on-one partner stunting, all of which developed my balance for when I was flying with my stunt group on Blast.
“Explain to me again why you're not on a senior team yet,” Gwen joked after working with Reid to toss me up for a kick double down. The move was a harder version of one we did on my junior level 3 team, only with an added rotation thrown in to make the move a harder stunt. When Gwen and Reid, who were both on a senior level 5 team, tossed me into the air I kicked one leg up by my head while keeping the other straight. Then, on the way down, I wiped my body around twice before I landed safely in their arms.
“I’ve only been cheering for a few months,” I reminded her.
In response, Gwen rolled her eyes and gave her long brown hair a dramatic flip. We both laughed since Gwen and I learned early on while practicing together that we were both tomboys. It was hard to believe it looking at Gwen in her hot pink shorts, TNT tank top with glittery pink letters, and matching hot pink cheer bow. But, much like me, she only looked the part thanks to the gym wardrobe rules. Gwen was on her school's soccer team and was one of the best goalies in the state. And sure, playing soccer didn’t make you a tomboy, but it was just one of the many things I learned about her that made me realize we were so much alike. Although she was 4 years older than me, we had gotten to become good friends through our time together in the weekly skills class.
“Want to run it again?” Reid asked. He ran a hand through his sweat-drenched hair, messing up the fauxhawk he had styled before practice. It was clear he was trying to keep us on track as Gwen and I continued to laugh, but that was easier said than done.
“Water break,” Gwen said with a shake of her head once she and I were done laughing.
While Reid and Gwen walked to grab their water bottles, I headed over to the air mat to work on my tumbling. It reminded me of an air mattress I used while camping, only built a little differently to give you extra bounce when working on a new trick. The spring loaded mats we performed on weren't bad, but during my skills class, I loved getting to use the air mat. It was like a perfect mix between the trampoline running track and actually being on a hard floor.
I wasn’t that tired after the flying we’d done in skills class, so I was happy to try some tumbling to really get in a good workout. Sure, I had to really ‘lock my core’ as Greg and Tonya always told me, but thanks to all the conditioning and practices at the gym it was pretty easy. I knew if Tonya, one of the gym owners and coaches, was at our skills practice she would make me work on stretches until Gwen and Reid were ready to do more flying again. But as much as I loved to be up in the air flying, I loved tumbling even more. So, without her there to keep me focused on just flying, I happily stepped onto the air mat to try out a few things I had been working on.
Giving myself a running start, I did a round off, then immediately launched myself into a back handspring and then a whip. The whip was more or less just a back tuck without the tuck, so as I flipped around and landed, I was able to push off a little harder for the final movement in the tumbling pass. Spinning in the air, I twisted my body around twice as fast I could, while also completing a backflip motion. The result of the two moves combined was a double full, which I almost landed. My toes hit the ground but the momentum of the move had me falling down onto my knees before I could firmly plant my heels on the ground. I let out a frustrated sigh and stood up to try it again.
“That was good height,” Greg said walking over to me. “Why don’t you try throwing a second back handspring in there before the whip for a little extra power?”
I nodded at Greg and tried again, this time doing two whips before trying the double full. I landed it easily that time, but then again, things were always a little easier when tried on the air mat. Moving to stand on the normal gym floor, I began trying the same series of moves on the blue spring-loaded mats that would be under me during competition. Knowing it would be a little harder to get high enough for the double full on the normal cheer floor, I tried a standard full a few times before trying the double. Each time I failed Greg would tell me how to move my body a little differently to get it right, or encourage me that I almost had it. When I applied his advice I could see the changes immediately. Thanks to my time in his skills class Greg had become like a big brother to me. He was closer in age to me than my coach, Nicole, or the other gym owners, but was still almost 30. Although, you wouldn’t know that by how he acted in the gym. Especially since he could still do all the tumbling he taught in his class. It shocked me at first to see him do kick fulls and double backflips, but when I learned more about his all star and college cheer experience, it made a little more sense.
“Okay,” I finally breathed after trying the tumbling pass a few more times. “I need water.”
“Good thinking,” Greg nodded. “Then let's go back to flying for a little. That should give you a break.”
I agreed easily, then grabbed my water bottle for a quick drink. After over an hour of working on different skills, I was thirstier than I realized. I quickly downed most of my water but stopped before finishing it off. Drinking that much might be a bad idea before I got thrown into the air, so I closed my water bottle’s cap then turned to get back on the mat.
“Let’s try some partner stunts for a while,” Greg said as I rejoined the group in the center of the mat. “Max just do a lib to start. Then, if that goes okay we can try a heel stretch tick tock and also a scorpion to arabesque.”
“Got it,” I smiled, the terms that were so confusing just a few months ago now simple and easy to follow. The idea of only one person holding me in the air was also something that would have been daunting not too long ago but was fast becoming no big deal. “Alright, who’s first?” I said to Gwen, Reid, Matthew, and Connor, ready to get picked up once again.
“So what do you think, seven full outs tonight before we hit?” Lexi asked me as we grabbed a drink. We had just finished the conditioning portion of our practice on Thursday evening. We spent a lot of time going over our standing jump sequence, but tried it using rubber bands around our feet to make it a little harder. In general, we had good height on our toe touches and hurdlers, but it was always good to work on the stretching that went with the moves as well.
“My bet’s nine,” I replied to Lexi’s question, already preparing for a lot of stunt falls from the other girls.
“At least.” Halley agreed. “I’m not really looking forward to Saturday too much right now.”
Lexi and I nodded in agreement as Nicole called the team back on the mat. I sat with Halley and Lexi to my left, and Anna to my right. We were a sea of black, white, and red, all of us in our matching practice uniforms and red bows. With 30 of us in total, it took a moment for us to settle down. Once we did, we were shocked at what Nicole had to tell us.
“We’re making some changes for this weekend,” Nicole said, her voice as serious as the look on her face. She was not a very tall woman, but she was intense all the same. Nicole had fiery red hair that was a tangle of curls that only made her bright green eyes pop even more. She was thin and muscular, still showing the strength she developed during years of all star cheerleading. Although she was wearing her glittery TNT Force staff shirt and jeans, it might as well have been a power suit. She was all business as she looked over us girls for a few seconds before continuing. “If we can’t hit the skills we have in the routine right now, then we need to take them out. So we’re going to water down your elite flying, take out some of the tumbling, and then we will see if we need to change any of pyramid. It’
s going to be a little harder than the routine we started the season with, but not quite the level we were going for last weekend.”
Around me, girls instantly began talking. I could hear girls chatting about how shocked they were since they were just getting used to the new changes. I also heard someone say how hard and long practice was going to be. But then, I heard a few people say they were excited since it meant they might finally stay in the air while flying or land all of their tumbling. As soon as I heard that my hand shot up in the air, desperate for answers.
“Yes, Max?” Nicole called on me, quieting the rest of the group.
“If we water down the routine then we won’t have a chance to win at Summit,” I said simply, having gone over our raw score compared to most other teams in our division at least a dozen times. I always loved looking at batting averages, team rankings, and stats for any sports teams I was a part of. So, with cheer, I would sit at home and watch YouTube videos and check score sheets to see how well a team did, and how much better they could have done if everything went as planned. I knew that by taking hard elements out of the Blast routine, there were at least two teams we would compete against at Summit that would have a higher raw score. Summit, an international competition in Florida, was the last competition of the season and winning first there had been the goal all year.
“Right now we need to focus on a clean routine,” Nicole explained, a look of defeat on her face. “If we can’t hit the basics then we will never have a chance to hit the harder skills we’ve been planning.”
