Cheerleading is a Sport | Teen Ink

Cheerleading is a Sport MAG

By Anonymous

     The New York Times states that cheerleading is the fastest growing girls’ sport, yet more than half of Americans do not believe it is a sport. In addition, they fail to distinguish between sideline cheerleaders and competitive ones. Sideline cheerleaders’ main goal is to entertain the crowd and lead them with team cheers, which should not be considered a sport. On the other hand, competitive cheerleading is a sport.

A sport, according to the Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Advisors, is a “physical activity [competition] against/with an opponent, governed by rules and conditions under which a winner is declared, and primary purpose of the competition is a comparison of the relative skills of the participants.” Because cheerleading follows these guidelines, it is a sport.

Competitive cheerleading includes lots of physical activity. Like gymnasts, cheerleaders must learn to tumble. They perform standing back flips, round flip flops, and full layout twists. Cheerleaders also perform lifts and tosses. This is where the “fliers” are thrown in the air, held by “bases” in different positions that require strength and cooperation with other teammates.

Just as basketball and football have guidelines for competitive play, so does competitive cheerleading. The whole routine has to be completed in less than three minutes and 15 seconds and the cheerleaders are required to stay within a certain area.

Competitive cheerleaders’ goal is to be the best. Just like gymnasts, they are awarded points for difficulty, technique, creativity and sharpness. The more difficult a mount or a stunt, the sharper and more in-sync the motions, the better the score. Cheerleading is a team sport so without cooperation and synchronization, first place is out of reach.

According to the National Center for Catastrophic Sport Injury Research, cheerleading is the number-one cause of serious sports injuries to women. Emergency room visits for cheerleading are five times the number than for any other sport, partially because they do not wear protective gear. While many athletes are equipped with hip pads, knee pads, shin guards or helmets, smiling cheerleaders are tossed into the air and spiral down into the arms of trusted teammates. The fliers must remain tight at all times so that their bases can catch them safely. Also, because cheerleading is not yet recognized as a sport by many schools, neither proper matting nor high enough ceilings are provided to ensure safety. Instead, the girls use whatever space is available. More recognition of competitive cheerleading as a sport would decrease the number of injuries.

So why do many Americans not think cheerleading is a sport? It cannot be because cheerleaders do not use balls or manipulate objects (if you do not count megaphones, pompoms and signs as objects). Wrestling, swimming, diving, track, cross-country, gymnastics, ice-skating and boxing are recognized sports that do not use balls. Some people argue that cheerleaders are just “flirts in skirts” with their only job to entertain the crowd, but cheerleaders today compete against other squads and work just as hard as other athletes.

Competitive cheerleading is a sport. It is a physical activity that is governed by rules under which a winner can be declared and its primary purpose is to compare the skills of participants. Hopefully, cheerleading will become as well-known a sport as football and basketball, and even appear in the Olympics since cheerleaders are just as athletic and physically fit as those involved in the more accepted sports.



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This article has 497 comments.


on Oct. 21 2012 at 12:31 pm
SarahHarmon GOLD, Lawrenceville, New Jersey
11 articles 1 photo 48 comments

Favorite Quote:
"I have learned that people will forget what you did, people will forget what you said, but people will never forget how you made them feel." ~Maya Angelou

Volleybal/cheergirl um, the national spelling bee is on espn too. Otherwise, I agree that competitive cheer is a sport.

peyton99 said...
on Oct. 18 2012 at 11:28 am
i truly belive that cheer is a sport and it should be a sport

on Oct. 12 2012 at 8:45 pm
theatregirl PLATINUM, Lathrup Village, Michigan
30 articles 12 photos 209 comments

Favorite Quote:
"To thine own self be true," -from Hamlet, a play by Shakespeare.
"I have sworn on the altar of god eternal hostility against all forms of tyranny over the mind of man." - Thomas Jefferson

I like your resoning. However, if cheerleading is sport, then Theater, Ballet, and Playing should sport. (

anonymous said...
on Oct. 8 2012 at 3:14 pm
CHEERLEADING IS DEFINITELY A SPORT. IN FACT, IT'S THE MOST DANGEROUS SPORT IN THE WORLD. You throw people in the air and catch them. If you don't that person will be dead. Cheerleading is basically the mix of ballet, gymnastics and dance. It's very complicated. WE MAY LOOK CUTE IN A SKIRT, BUT THIS IS VIOLENT.

cheergirl101 said...
on Oct. 4 2012 at 4:49 pm
i am 16 and have cheered for 10 years cheer is definetley a sport u work and train the same or maybe even harder than any sport u may not play against another team but it is a sport!!!

blarp said...
on Sep. 20 2012 at 6:33 pm
pretty girls/short skirts, i think its a sport

cheer247 said...
on Sep. 12 2012 at 12:39 pm
ok so I have been in my fair share of arguments on this topic. I have competitively cheered for the past 8 years. the body control and discipline it takes to cheer CANNOT be compared to ANY sport. tell me what sport requires your body to be in overdrive for over 3 minutes with no cease. Flipping your body up off the ground that some people could only ever dream of attempting and throwing others 10 feet in the air just to safely catch them again. football players, basketball players etc, work very hard BUT they might go in for a few plays then theyre back on the sidelines taking a break not to mention the rest they get berween plays. Honestly though, I think this argument is a little tired. Me, being a competitive cheerleader for 8 years, would rather cheerleading NOT be a sport, shocking I know right? But just hear me out. we would have less of this rediculous, pointless banter. and also in the state of Florida, at least, but im sure it applies in other states, when we were recognized as a sport, they started making all these rules, telling us we couldnt do certain tricks tumbling and stunts because they were "too dangerous" this doesnt allow cheerleading to reach its full potential or allow cheerleaders to excel. but people can say what they want, all I now is there is no greater feeling than stepping out on that mat with a team that you love and the rush of hitting a perfect routine that took months of practice. I dont care what anyone says. to each his own. Do what you LOVE. and I love cheerleading.

on Sep. 11 2012 at 2:21 pm
FYI AndriaStar Cheerleading score ARE based on points, not just opinion! Did you read the article at all?? The routine's jumps, stunts, tumbling and cheers are rated on scales of either 1-10 or 1-5(it all depends), and how each of those things are preformed is how they are rated. If someone falls from a stunt, the score for that set of stuntsis lowered. That doesn't sound like opinion to me! And so what if you don't have contact with other teams, neither does Gymnastics (or the army). And if you say that that isn't a sport, I don't know what is! The Army may be more challenging or harder than cheer, but that doesn't mean that it isn't a sport! And how does cheer not prepare you for the army? You have to be strong and flexible, you have to have really good endurance, and you have to memorize a complicated routine. But I do agree with SOME cheerleaders being prissy jerks though ;)

Boring said...
on Sep. 10 2012 at 9:58 pm
Everybody at my school hates the cheerleaders. Not because they are popular (they are in fact very unattractive and unpopular) but because they are annoying and quite bad. Half the team is made up of middle school girls who look garish wearing too much makeup. Somehow our team did very well in the national cheerleading competition last year (in the non tumbling division). Even after they won the whole school either ignored it or treated it as a joke.

on Sep. 10 2012 at 9:53 pm
....Volleybal/cheergirl, you do realize that this person agrees with you right? By the dictionary definition of a "sport," (what you said in your post), competetive cheerleading is a sport. Writer_Jordan agrees. However, sideline cheerleading is obviously not. Why? Quite simply, its because the cheerleaders arent competing against anyone. The competition is going on in the game (football, basketball, volleyball ect.) The cheerleaders lead the crowd in cheering. If sideline cheerleading is a sport, then spectating is also a sport. 

Cheerlious said...
on Aug. 31 2012 at 10:58 am
Cool artical i guess!!!!

loveforcheer said...
on Aug. 1 2012 at 8:33 am
Why isn't it a sport though? You can't just not defend your answer...

loveforcheer said...
on Aug. 1 2012 at 8:31 am
Just because it's based on opinions, doesn't mean it's less of a sport. Gymnastics and diving is based on opinions and yet it's a sport. Cheerleaders may not have contact with other teams, but you know what they have a lot of contact with one another, especially when they toss people up in the air. Look up "Basket Toss" on Youtube, try doing it with your friends and maybe you will think otherwise.

loveforcheer said...
on Aug. 1 2012 at 8:26 am
It's like gymnastics and diving. They're sports and yet the score is not based on concrete events. And yet, they're sports and are in the olympics. I don't understand why you need concrete events to consider an activity as intense as cheerleading, a sport.

KVBraund said...
on Jul. 24 2012 at 12:48 pm

It's quite simple really. Not all 'sports' require direct competition to be considered a sport, take gymnastics for example.

 

As for your second point.. erm have you seen cheerleaders abs, biceps and core strength? Needless to say, cheerleading would prepare you for the army for more than any other female sport. Not to mention the pain - trust me, we go through a lot of it. We're used to it, not prissy jerks.


Kelcheers said...
on Jul. 18 2012 at 4:33 pm

What would we say?

"R-U-N! Run around that track again!"


Kelcheers said...
on Jul. 18 2012 at 4:25 pm
Gymnastics and ice skating are also scored by a panel of judges, and they're Olympic sports! Just because your favorite sport is based on a ball going through a hoop or crossing over a line doesn't mean every sport must be that way.

addison said...
on Jul. 16 2012 at 9:29 am
technically by your logic gymnastics wouldnt me a sport then..

jp87 said...
on Jul. 11 2012 at 1:50 pm
Ryan you're definition of a sport based on the point scoring system it uses is flawed. Cheerleading (much like gymnastics, diving and many others) is scored by a judge but the score that is given is not as subjective as people seem to think. These sports are marked on a very strict system which awards for execution and skill lever etc. The points and deductions are standardized and skills and moves are given numerical values in terms of difficulty. Thus saying that a different panel would produce a different outcome is not accurate. Obviously there is room for human error which means that there is some subjectivity but that is true of any sport. How many times have sports commentators or angry fans disagreed with a referee's decision in a football match about who touched who where and who was offside...?

on Jul. 10 2012 at 2:20 pm
I have been a cheerleader since i was 7 years old, i can understand how sideline cheering is not a sport. Sideline cheer however does require alot of practice. but its not competing for anything, we're just there to cheer on our team, nothing wrong with sideline cheer not being a sport. as a sideline cheerleader. i feel like i'm an athlete as much as some one who plays football or basketball. I practice almost everyday of the week and i give everything i have to it. me and my teammates are dedicated to something that people claim isnt even a sport. i think thats a true athlete. :) so i guess im proud not have a sport.