Newbie As Of Tonight:)

[Lpasto]

My DD is a USAG competitive gymnast but used to be a cheerleader as well. She quit cheer to solely focus on gymnastics for years and greatly misses it. She is entering freshman year of high school in fall 2021 and thinks she wants to tryout for cheer and solely focus on that in high school. I have a curious question because she appears to still be torn! If she chose to tryout in sophomore year, is it harder to make the team because they kind of already have “their gals and guys” and coaches have faves that start from the jump? Is it one of those sports that if you don’t jump back into it as a freshman, then you may lose your opportunity? I was a cheerleader myself from about birth through half of college. I feel like that was how it was back then so I was wondering what your opinions were? Is that still the case? And for the record, I am older at 45 according to my daughter:)

 

[retiredl5cheer]

I like to believe that most schools take the best athletes for the team, regardless of whether they're newbies or returners. However, if it's between two athletes with the exact same skillset, they may choose the "known commodity" rather than the newbie. Another thing to consider is the year of cheer experience that your daughter will miss if she skips freshman year. The other athletes in her grade will have practiced and improved over the course of that year.

 

[Knowcheering]

My DD is a USAG competitive gymnast but used to be a cheerleader as well. She quit cheer to solely focus on gymnastics for years and greatly misses it. She is entering freshman year of high school in fall 2021 and thinks she wants to tryout for cheer and solely focus on that in high school. I have a curious question because she appears to still be torn! If she chose to tryout in sophomore year, is it harder to make the team because they kind of already have “their gals and guys” and coaches have faves that start from the jump? Is it one of those sports that if you don’t jump back into it as a freshman, then you may lose your opportunity? I was a cheerleader myself from about birth through half of college. I feel like that was how it was back then so I was wondering what your opinions were? Is that still the case? And for the record, I am older at 45 according to my daughter:)

Given your daughter is a USAG gymnast and likely can tumble, she'd make most high school teams easily (as long as she can throw basic tumbling like a back handspring on a non-spring floor). Most schools would jump at an opportunity to add someone who can tumble, even if that person lags behind somewhat in the cheerleading aspect, since tumbling on HS teams tends to be scarce (especially more advanced tumbling like layouts and fulls, standing tucks, etc). I wouldn't worry about whether she tries out freshman or sophomore year, it likely won't matter. Unless your HS has an insane amount of talent in it (rarely the case) and a ton of kids trying out, or is the complete opposite and doesn't care about skill level at all and just selects kids based on how popular they are or who they know, etc, your daughter will be fine.