When are tryouts for the football and basketball seasons?

Try-outs for cheerleading are held for each season. In the spring, (May) there are tryouts for the Fall Football season. The girls then attend cheerleading practice through the Summer. Mandatory Practice can not be started until about two weeks before the start of school. (Lapeer School District Policy) In November, there are try-outs for the Basketball and Competitive Cheer season.

How many girls can be on the Competitive Cheer Squad?

The number of girls and the type of stunts allowed and not allowed is dictated by Michigan Cheerleading Coaches Associations and Michigan High School Athletic Association Rules and Regulations. ( See the links at the bottom of the page for specific information.)

Currently we are allowed to have 12-16 girls on the floor depending upon what round it is in the competitions. The competitions our squad preform in are selected by the cheer coaches. We have to pay and enterance fee for each team to compete.

Email from MHSAA related to rules and regulations for Competitive Cheerleading:

MHSAA Cheer Manual and National Federation Rules Booklet, along with the Michigan insert are available from MHSAA. If your school has declared that the cheer team is a Competitive Cheer Team, the school should have received the mailing in October. If you are a MHSAA registered official, you should have received the same packet.

The manual tells you everything that you need to know about competitive cheer for the upcoming 2001-02 season. Try-outs are not referenced in the manual, as it is the district/athletic departmentor director/coach(s) who choose how the try-out is to be runned. If you need advice on how to run a try-out, you may want to consider asking other competitive coaches in your area what they do.

To receive the mailing, contact Suzanne Martin, MHSAA, at 1-517-332-5046. The is a charge for the manual and the National Federation Rule Booklet.

What kind of shoes are used for the Fall Football Season?

For football, the teams can use the same shoes they used the previous year (even from jr high), or any white cheer shoe, (No inserts or white inserts.) New shoes will be selected and purchased at the start of B-Ball/competition season. The coaches will let you know around November what style of cheer shoe to purchase. When you buy the shoes for 7th grade cheerleading remember to buy them with some growing room and you can use them through the freshman season. The jr high and high school coaches work together to select the shoes best suited to cheerleading.

What color body suit will we wear for football?

For JV/Fresh games will need her blue bodysuit & briefs (The reason we use navy color in 8th, so they can get more use out of the bodysuit! ) ALL teams use blue for football all through high school.

When will the new (freshman) girls get their windsuits?

Windsuits are considered a personal purchase and not normally part of the uniform. The Pizza Kit money, raised by the freshman, will be used for purchase of the Wind Suits. (October, 2001.) They will belong to the girls and have their names put on them. The girl will have to sell 20 pizza kits to make the $100, the wind suits cost. ($5.00 profit per pizza kit x 20 =$100.) The girls will have to make up the difference between their sale profit and the $100 if they are unable to raise the money.

Money raised by Varsity (who already have their wind suits) will be used toward paying for the white uniforms. We need to raise over $2500 for the white uniforms, wanted for competition.

August, 2001:

Varsity Coach has stated that she does not plan to have any more than thirty girls on any of the teams; freshman,JV and varsity. That will mean a total of 90 girls in any season. The Boosters will be planning to buy sets of 30 uniforms for future purchases.

The freshman uniforms are pretty new,(hand me downs only a couple of years old) newer than the 7-8th grade uniforms, at Zemmer.

The Jv's were purchased last Jan. (2001) but they need whites, during b-ball/competition season. The teams usually have two sets of uniforms; blues and whites.

These are needed new for each team, although if they are purchased for Varsity this yr. the ones they have now will go to JV.

I believe we ordered JV and V sweaters and new V uniforms, along with new pants for every team. (delivered and in use as of September 22, 2001)

Freshman will even have (passed down-but fairly new) sweaters which is a first. This is the first year they have sweaters. This is only the second year we've even HAD a freshman TEAM in years. The improvements in the 7th and 8th grade program have resulted in being able have expanded programs in the high school.

Why do the girls have to wear the same color camp shorts and shirts to practice?

Freshman Coach J. stated, when the girls are all wearing the same colors during practice it helps her to evaluate the team's coordination and functioning as a group. When the girls wear different colors it is distracting and harder to judge if they are doing their jumps, movements the same. So be sure to have the girls take good care to their camp outfits as they will be using them again for practice.

The shorts can also be purchased ($7.00) at Coaches Corner in downtown Lapeer. The girls will need blue, red, green and black. Be sure to check the sale racks.

CHEER ZONE

If you have any questions please email me and I will try to find out the answers and post them here. I am sure others will need the same information.

Rochester Cheerleading Report:

How many times have you gone to a game and the cheerleaders had long boring pauses between cheers; repeated the same cheers too often or worse echoed the other team’s cheers and chants, or cheered at inappropriate times. We went to Rochester H.S. to see their game on September 29, 2001. A group of co-workers from my husband's work, have their kids going there, playing on the football team and cheering. We had a great tailgate party for lunch and then met for BBQ and volleyball after the game.

I was impressed with the Rochester cheerleading team. I now know why their cheerleaders, have won eleven State Championships. Their repertoire of chants and cheers was impressive. I asked the coach and they have 60-80 cheers they can do without repetition. They cheered continuously, more often then any other team I have witnessed. (I tape their cheerleading and taped about double the amount of film I usually get.)

They cheered at appropriate times between the football plays so as not to distract from the field action. The chants went along with the defensive and offensive action on the field. The chants were preformed, in a timely manner, co-ordinate between play, so as not to distract the spectators. The girls worked with the band and did several different dances skits. They execute their cheers and chants with precision and accuracy. After each cheer they did individual stunts, back walk-overs, flips, cartwheels jumps, etc. They incorporated lifts and floor stunts (safely) in their cheers. They really got the crowd involved in the cheers using signs, megaphones and “cheerleader- parent-plants” to get the crowd going along with the cheer. The band members also echoed their cheers.

I know a lot of teams do some of these activities, but the Rochester Team did them all, with percision and quality as well as quanity. I think that is why they are state champs. I suggest in the future, our teams, freshman,JV, and Varsity take bus-man holidays to observe / tape the best cheer teams in action on the field/ court and at competitions.

ADDENDUM:

Besides, home-coming with the traditional homecoming activities. Rochester has two senior day celebrations honoring graduating students. Today, I witnessed a presentation of the graduating football players and cheerleaders with their parents,during the half time. All the moms were given a red rose and commemerative ribbon. They will have another Senior day where the graduating band members and their parents are presented. I think this would be a nice idea for Lapeer West to honor the Senior players who have devoted so many years to the athletic program.

Rochester also had the Middle School do a presentation alone and with the H.S. Marching Band. This is to give them exposure and practice before their competition next week.

NOTES:

• precision chants
• Lines and formation neat and straight at all times
• Projected an Attitude, that CHEERLEADING was their JOB ! ! !
• Group stunts and lifts
• Individual stunts after each chant
• Co-ordinated with the band, mult dances and interaction...NEVER boring
• Exhibited a sense of community / STRONG FLOOR PRESENCE
• Effective use of mega phones, poster board signs and pom pons,
• Co-ordinated with the plays cheer done as football players were setting up for the play or during down times. They added to the atmosphere and did not distract from the football action.
• Cheerleader, ran a school flag around the area, when they scored a touch down. (Athens H.S. 36 / ROCHESTER 14)
• Effective crowd cheer, using different methods to get the crowd involved. "Plants" in the crowd that help lead other spectators, mega phones, poster signs, going into the crowd.

• Quantity (60-80) as well as quality

• • 20 OFFENSIVE CHEERS, INCLUDING KICK OFF CHANTS
  • 20 DEFENSIVE CHEERS
  • The chants were nothing special, you can find identical ones on line at About.com or Cheerleading.Net, but it was the execution of the chants and cheers that made them special.