All-Star Discussing The Value Of Tumbling In Io(c) 5/6

[torsten]

Right, but what kind of win is that?

A win that helps the international team to become more popular in his home country and a win against the best teams in the world under these specific rules (almost no tumbling). Is it a win that those teams can be proud of? Yes! Is it showing that they are the best overall cheerleaders? No!

Additionally, it makes routines less interesting to watch.

I definitely agree with that!

There are only so many stunt and pyramid sections a team can do before it starts to get repetitive.

I think you can say the same about tumbling.

 

[King]

I'm completely with you. Although I'm not a tumbler I really like seeing this amazing allstar tumbling and I'd really love to see more gyms over here. To answer your question I'd say that there are several goals that should be attained with the rulebook. One of these goals certainly is to increase the skill level in cheerleading. To do so it is necessary in my opinion to have quality gyms with well trained personal. Financing such a gym is not easy and you cannot waste your time and money practicing skills (or providing the equipment) that are nearly of no use at competition. So yes, to have great tumbling, you have to have a balanced scoresheet.

Other goals of a rulebook are e.g. make the sport safe, make it fun, make it interesting so that people want to get involved in the sport and give the athletes a system that offers him opportunities to be successful at different stages of his/her personal development. Having an age grid and a skills level system does provide these opportunities. So why not have a division that offers winning opportunites at worlds for teams that come from countries where cheerleaders mostly don't have access to good gyms? It has been said in another post that there are no athletes from Africa compete at winter olympics, because they don't have "access" to snow and it no one would ever have the idea of creating a special division for Africa at e.g. skiing. That's right. But that same sport has different competitions for different skills: downhill and slalom. Only a few athletes are good at both. Maybe we should have something similar, i.e. stunt oriented cheerleading and tumble oriented cheerleading as well as a combination (in skiing there's also combined).

I enjoy well thought out posts. Thanks!

 

[Gary]

Changing the scoresheet SO much to assist the International teams is similar to telling the Heavyweight Boxing champion that he has to defend his belt with his hands tied behind his back....All the training he has accrued to this point is now cut in half...sure you can Dodge, Duck, Dip, Dive, and....Dodge! haha But those other skills you had are now useless. I think it kind of tarnishes any victory that could possibly happen. Why not make it more balanced so as to help provide gyms overseas with a source of income (tumbling classes) as well as legitimize a possible victory if they were to achieve it....and bump up the scoresheet in 6 to accommodate the more advanced building skills.If the TRUE goal of an international team is to beat a US team...why not do it legitimately?

 

[torsten]

I enjoy well thought out posts. Thanks!

Thanks. So do I I think this is a good moment to tell you that you're doing a great job with fierceboard! There are so many interesting facts, ideas and opinions on here. This board is a big inspiration to me!

 

[torsten]

Changing the scoresheet SO much to assist the International teams is similar to telling the Heavyweight Boxing champion that he has to defend his belt with his hands tied behind his back....All the training he has accrued to this point is now cut in half...sure you can Dodge, Duck, Dip, Dive, and....Dodge! haha But those other skills you had are now useless. I think it kind of tarnishes any victory that could possibly happen.

What about telling a MMA fighter not to use his legs and not to do any ground fighting? Practically that would make him a boxer. Does the existence of MMA fighting tarnish any victory of a Heavyweight Boxing champion?

 

[Gary]

What about telling a MMA fighter not to use his legs and not to do any ground fighting? Practically that would make him a boxer. Does the existence of MMA fighting tarnish any victory of a Heavyweight Boxing champion?

Absolutely not! So long as they weren't fighting each other...I suppose this will end up having to be one of those agree to disagree things huh? I still think that the benefits in the LONG RUN to international cheerleading far outweigh the costs of not having a champion in the nearer future...forcing international teams to have tumbling will allow tumbling classes to take off. And I have no OFFICIAL stats on the issue but I'll say at my gym tumbling classes are our main money making classes. Anyone in the US staying open from stunt classes?

 

[Gary]

I don't want it to seem that I am biased toward having an American champion forever...I simply think that it's a better road to help developing cheer nations build the same kind of infrastructure we have here so that the sport can gain a stronger foothold and grow exponentially...instead of the method of just trying to get an international team to the top as soon as humanly possible.

 

[torsten]

Right, the goal is the same, but the routes are different. You're absolutely right that we need to improve our infrastructure over here to be successful in the long run. I'm just saying that going the other route, too, doesn't hurt the American gyms, because they still have the regular level 5 rules. They don't need to send a team to compete at international 5. It helps us to promote the sport over here to get more people involved so that one time we will be enough to have gyms that can make money with cheerleading. Right now the number of privately owned gyms in Germany that make money with cheerleading is zero