Switching Divisions For Big Competitions.

[SheCheersIPay]

Hiya Everyone. I have a question, is it normal for teams to switch to a LOWER division during big competitions such as Cheersport, INDY & NCA? Also in your PERSONAL opinion, do you think it's fair for a lets say a senior 5 team to drop down to a level 4 team or a level 4 team drop down to a level 2 or is it all about winning and switching to a division you feel will give you the best advantage? I'm not 100% sure how I feel about it and really wanted to hear everyone's opinion :)

 

[icecheermom]

I think it stinks!!! This happened to us last year at Cheerport. A team that had a full paid bid to worlds went against us in Senior Restricted. They won and maybe even had the highest score of the competition. Hopefully EP's will make a rule like NCA has this year to try and make it more difficult to do this but there are always ways around it :)

 

[SheCheersIPay]

Yeah I was wondering about that. I honestly understand wanting to win and wanting the cheerleaders to have the best possible chance to win. However, I do think that it should be done fairly. Not to say that it is "unfair", I just really didn't understand switching divisions to a lower division for certain competitions. I guess it happens, but it would be nice if there were some sort of rules about that.

 

[Sbelle]

IMO it is not "fair" to drop a level so that you can increase your chances of winning. This is happening to one of my friends teams this year going to Cheersport. Her team is a small senior coed 3 and a team from the west coast who has been a senior coed 4 ALL season is dropping down to a 3 for this competition. IMO it's just not right....

 

[SheCheersIPay]

I think a few teams are doing that. One of the teams in the senior 4 division have been Senior 5 all year. I don't think it's right either IMO

 

[Born2Tumble]

I think some teams do that because of Injuries to members of the team. For example Krissa's Junior 2 tam is going to have to compete Senior 2 this upcoming competition because someone was injured and the only fill in we had was 15 years old. So I think in a case like that it is fine but just dropping levels so that you can win is really unfair!!

 

[whatsupWILLIS]

I don't really think its fair to drop down, but in some cases, like last year at UCA Nationals in Florida, all the teams in the Junior Coed Level 4 division were actually all Junior Coed 5 teams, none of the teams were actually 4 and our team dropped down just because it would be exactly the same competing in the level 5 division.

 

[Cheergenious]

We see that quite a bit here. We have a gym that is notorious for dropping a level to score a trophy. I personally think it makes your gym look weak...not strong. Problem is, most don't know about it when it happens.

 

[fiercerthanthenext]

one year at cheersport we went against a level 4 team competing in the 4.2 division (i think there was injury purposes, not specifically to win.) so they had full team tumbling/specialties in all portions of the routine