What Do You Think Of This Excuse?

[cheerinatorXdad]

Our gym went to NCA in Dallas and didn't fair so well. Some comments from judges that our routines were bland. That got a lot of parents mad because they're pouring out a lot of money and time to not do well. i.e. a bad return on your investment. Some parents questioned one of the tumbling coaches and his excuse was, "well, our routines are more geared toward UCA instead of NCA."
I thought that was pretty weak. Any thoughts?

 

[NJ Coach]

Our gym went to NCA in Dallas and didn't fair so well. Some comments from judges that our routines were bland. That got a lot of parents mad because they're pouring out a lot of money and time to not do well. i.e. a bad return on your investment. Some parents questioned one of the tumbling coaches and his excuse was, "well, our routines are more geared toward UCA instead of NCA."
I thought that was pretty weak. Any thoughts?

Uca and nca are the same scoresheet now. I'd buy that excuse a few years ago, but not today.

 

[Mcfierceburger]

Every parent thinks their kid is 'Gifted' and maybe some of them are. Just because the team didn't do well doesn't mean it gives the parents a right to blame somebody... if anything its the cheerleaders that should be copping it (yup no matter what age). its not as if this thing is a new subject... parents in Gymnastics are always thinking their child will make it to the Olympics! if they are really not that happy they should find a solution to support the coaches and get the team to work harder and become a better team. in saying all that somebody has to come last!

 

[Mamarazzi]

if anything its the cheerleaders that should be copping it (yup no matter what age). its not as if this thing is a new subject...

Wait, the comments on the scoresheet said that the routine was bland. And the athletes are at fault for that? How's that work, unless the minis did their own choreography...

 

[GreatWhite92]

Wait, the comments on the scoresheet said that the routine was bland. And the athletes are at fault for that? How's that work, unless the minis did their own choreography...

You can have awesome choreography but with out the cheerleaders energy to make it look exciting, its going to look bland. But it goes both ways, you could have terrible choreography and exciting cheerleaders and it will still looks bland. However, if you have enough energy and performance than you can make bad choreography looks at least somewhat exciting, so I have to think the cheerleaders energy had something to do with it.

 

[Mamarazzi]

You can have awesome choreography but with out the cheerleaders energy to make it look exciting, its going to look bland. But it goes both ways, you could have terrible choreography and exciting cheerleaders and it will still looks bland. However, if you have enough energy and performance than you can make bad choreography looks at least somewhat exciting, so I have to think the cheerleaders energy had something to do with it.

But then, don't you think the comment might be something more along the lines of "low energy?" Maybe I'm not seeing this right, and Lord knows I don't look at scoresheet comments...

 

[David]

That's one of my biggest issues with cheer. Too much objectivity. One judge may say bland and the other might not. And yes it's the same score sheet, but NCA judges still judge differently and like different things than UCA judges. It is possible for a routine to be more "geared" towards another company.

 

[SheCheers]

Based upon being at both competitions this year and hearing our coaches discuss the scores/comments after day 1 at both events...I will say that NCA was definitely more strictly scoring (at least in terms of our J3). CP's team didn't have it's best performance at NCA at all, but their execution scores were super low (between 2 and 4 in all categories) and while they were pretty clean at UCA, they weren't perfect and they still scored 6.8-7 in execution. I also think that what might have been a bobble deduction at NCA was just taken off execution at UCA.

i will also say that I believe UCA and NCA prefer certain "styles"...not that i can define them..for example WCSS going for straight pony tails at UCA possibly to gear towards UCA's "clean" preference. At any rate UCA seems to really like our gyms' routines and the judges give lots of compliments and NCA can go either way, with more constructive criticism than compliments.