College Why do colleges compete on hard floor?

[heavenly]

Kingston,

Is that a pregnant person up in that stunt? If so, does that equate to a two man stunt?

 

[XtremeAthlete]

they want us to suffer the older we get! thats why! AND thats why cheersport makes us compete at the crack of dawn, the older we get the more they love to see us suffer!! hahaha

That's true, but it's smart on their part. Even though the older divisions could potentially draw some large crowds, as an event producer, the last thing you want is a bunch of college age kids, or older... running around tearing up the hotels, etc, because they know they can sleep in the next day. At least making them wake up earlier and report by 7am (even hungover) it encourages most to try and turn in somewhat early.

Of course there are always exceptions......

 

[XtremeAthlete]

Kingston,

Is that a pregnant person up in that stunt? If so, does that equate to a two man stunt?

It's a double cupie... or maybe a 1.5 Cupie? Just glad to see that the other arm is by your hip UCA style and not floating out there in the air just in case you need to two-arm it!

 

[anoniiexo]

to make a college squad you have to tumble on hard floors, during football games you throw your passes on the field, during basketball you tumble on a basketball court. So since it's required of you to already have great tumbling without spring it makes sense for college cheerleaders to have to tumble on a hard mat.... besides the obvious money issue.

 

[Deleted member 5411]

they want us to suffer the older we get! thats why! AND thats why cheersport makes us compete at the crack of dawn, the older we get the more they love to see us suffer!! hahaha

You sound like my daughter! lol! She did college, and is back with allstars. She says her body can't handle the beating of the hard mat. She makes jokes like yours all the time.

 

[ShoWStoppeR]

surprisingly, my team hates spring floor. they can feel a difference. but then again they were all bred on dead mat lol i love my spring, but it actually is weird going back to spring from dead after you've been on it so long. we worked a comp yesterday that was spring floor (allstars) and i went to warm up some tumbling, and i like, couldnt lol it felt so weird, it was like my gravitational pull was off or something haha my tumbling has improved so much since i started tumbling on dead mat, because you have no choice but to do it right or you die. but at the same time, i DEFINITELY feel the beating so much more on dead mat. i have to ice every night, and aleve has become my best friend. so in the long run, spring would be the better option i think. it definitely could prevent so many injuries from happening. i think the biggest reason it isnt a universal thing is the biggest issue of, colleges dont have a spring floor to practice on. heck, some dont even have mats to practice on. so it would suck to compete on spring and practice on dead, and kind of defeat the purpose a little.

 

[Num1Stunta]

Maybe, but that doesn't seem like the intention of hard floor... to make things harder. I thought we took away double fulls, trick double twisting baskets, and full twisting rewinds to make things easier and safer? Why would we keep one thing to make it harder but another to make it safer? And if a tumbler were to bust on a spring floor wouldnt that be safer than busting on a hard floor?

Also, finals on the stage at NCA has been described as a spring floor because of the stage. Not NEARLY as dead as the mat on cement. I have seen quite a few tumblers over rotate on certain years because they will bound in the middle of a plank on the stage and get too much height. We dont seem to care too much then if it is like a spring floor.

PS - why the heck 1 1/2's are still legal I have no idea. Those are more ACL blowing than doubles.

I can vouch for that! I biffed my bhs back there in 03, landed on my knees and popped back up like I was on a trampoline. I was front and dead center and we never took a hit for it because it really didnt look like I landed on my knees. I would almost venture to say it's more bouncy than a spring floor if you hit directly on a beam..

 

[RealTalk25]

I don't think I agree with that.. some parts are bouncy, but others are DEAD (where the stages connect).. I don't think it's comparable to a spring floor.. I almost touched out on a one to full that I hit fine in pre-lims on the cement floor.. either way, I think that colleges compete on hard floor because it's traditional (andddd because of the cost), not because of the safety.. Making all of those tricks (3 trick baskets, doubles, twisting rewinds) illegal was the safety aspect. Someone said it earlier, spring floor was ADDED to all star.. my first few years of all star were on hard floor.. Yes, it's hard to go from spring to hard, when you transition to college, but at the same time, I think it's cool to see who the really good people are.. I get more impressed by good passes on hard floor than spring floor.. Spring floor does half the work for you.

 

[airbornecheer]

If college programs go to stunts and tumbling or usa cheer I believe that schools will support purchasing the spring floor for the safety of their athletes, it would be like a basketball team playing on asphault. I just don't get it, if the schools could do one major fundraiser they could afford the spring floor.

 

[RealTalk25]

Not necessarily.. a lot of schools are already doing major fundraising just to get to nationals. Calendar and shirt sales, car washes, sponsorships, clinics.. All of which pay for uniforms, practice gear, nationals trips, etc.. Some schools don't even have their own practice facilities, so getting a spring floor would be totally out. Also, some schools don't really care that much about their cheerleaders.. Just because they see that it MAY (or may not) be safer (I don't think there has been any real proof that spring floor is "safer," except for the wear and tear aspect), doesn't mean they'll be on board to make a $10,000 purchase for a program that may not even be priority at their school.

In reference to the USA Cheer thing.. Where does it say anywhere on that website that spring floor is safer? If I sent the president of my university to that website to try to claim that we need a spring floor because it's safer, he'd probably look at me like I'm crazy because no where on there does it say that.


Also, there is plenty of street basketball.. most parks have outdoor hoops on cement.. I'm not sure how that is comparable to this topic.. Clarification?

 

[cheerforeverever]

Plus not all schools have the typical football spirit squad cheerleading teams. There are many universities where the cheerleading team is there to support mainly basketball or is a club organization (both of which instances the school doesn't think of them as part of athletics), therefore the athletics department could care less about what they do/ if they have mats to practice on. These teams are using mats older than dirt if they even have them and cant afford new flat mats let alone spring floor.

 

[retiredl5cheer]

Not necessarily.. a lot of schools are already doing major fundraising just to get to nationals. Calendar and shirt sales, car washes, sponsorships, clinics.. All of which pay for uniforms, practice gear, nationals trips, etc.. Some schools don't even have their own practice facilities, so getting a spring floor would be totally out.

YES and YES!

In addition, here's the solution we have to prevent injuries. We tumble once a week at an all star gym with a spring floor, so new skills are learned and old skills are improved on the spring floor. Nothing is moved to the hard mat until it is READY. This eliminates wear and tear on our bodies and helps to make sure we are not injured from a fall.

I'd love to compete on a spring floor, of course, but I see why it won't happen.