Our cheer team put it all out there on the floor. We won’t stop trying to get better… bring on Ontarios!

He said

Well, we got back to Cheer comps this weekend. In fact, we literally just got back from Niagara Falls and the Border Showdown. But before we talk about how it went, let’s talk about the big concern heading into this weekend… the weather. Leading into the weekend we were dealing with some extremely low temperatures as well as some routine bouts of snow. In fact, Friday into Saturday was forecasted snow squalls making challenging driving conditions in our area. The good news is, the forecast improved drastically today. And, the other good news is that Sov’s (Emelia’s team) time slot made it possible for us to drive down and back today, so we did—without incident.

In the last few weeks, Sov has had some major changes in their lineup which then led to major changes in their routine. In fact a couple of practices ago, when Danielle was watching a practice she said it looked like a completely different routine – so much so – that the girls looked a little confused. But, the team is full of hard working and determined girls and they persevered through and did their best to get it all down. So whatever they were able to get done today performance-wise, we were proud at their level of tenacity and adjustment they have been through in the past couple of weeks.

Now, for the performance, aside from Emelia landing on her knees on her round-off back handspring, back tuck, two other girls had tumbling deductions potentially. But, aside from that, the rest of their routine looked clear and without errors. I will never pretend to understanding Cheer scoring and how they place teams, because we watched at least three or four other teams have major building falls, and in the end Sov didn’t even crack the top 7. And those three or four teams did. The only thing we figure is their adjusted routine just doesn’t have enough difficulty.

Emelia was disappointed in herself, as she always is—focused just on what she did wrong and not what the team was able to accomplish. It is always hard to watch her go through this process and we always try to bring her back to all the other positives and things that did go well. But, she has been working a lot at that with Wrestling thanks to Danielle, I was able to see the transformation of focus of what she did wrong switch much quicker to spending this once her lifetime, time with her teammates and just enjoying this and we left The Falls with her already in a much better mindset.

We’re so proud of you Boo for the work you and your teammates did, and the growth you are showing. It sucks when you don’t result you feel you deserve, but it doesn’t erase the friendships you’ve made or the work you’ve put into it!

She said

With another Cheer Competition under Emelia’s belt we are officially at the half way point for Emelia’s cheer season. It has been a challenging year, the team has been battered and bruised but they never, ever give up. As we returned to training in the new year we found out there was a chance that one of the girls’ teammate was not returning to the team. And again for reasons we do not understand they did not replace the teammate with a stand in replacement. But instead pulled the routine apart and rebuilt it to accommodate.

The girls worked so hard over the last few weeks adjusting and we went into this competition with guarded feelings on how they would do. This competition is a bit different than any of their other competitions. This one is known as a showdown. How this is different vs other competitions the teams are all against each other no matter size and age division. If you are level 3 you go against every other level 3. What this means for small teams like Emelia’s, is they are against massive teams who can have 7 stunt groups that can do much more elaborate stunts. It is exciting but at the same time very confusing.

The girls went in nervous, but as we said with all the changes the girls did AMAZING. They had clean stunts and went out with insane energy. Other than some tumbling errors they were clean. And then we waited for the results. For this competition they given a leader board, after watching a number of teams have major building falls and stumbling that didn’t land we were shocked when their team didn’t reach the top 7 while these other teams made it through. I fully expected that with the changes, they were not going to be top 3 but not out of the top 7. It is so disheartening for the girls, they worked so hard adjusting to all the changes and had a strong routine just to not get the results they hoped for.

They go back to practice on Tuesday to start working again to build a stronger routine to prepare for Ontario Championships in 3 weeks. All I can say is that as parents we are beyond proud of the girls. They stayed strong as a team and keep building each other up against all the odds.