The COVID-19 pandemic left its mark on all fall sports, and even pushed cheerleading into the winter season.
Gilmer High School competition cheerleaders endured all of the practice restrictions that other athletes faced, which included limited interactions and small work out groups.
The team normally begins fall conditioning in March and installs the choreography for its upcoming routine in June. This year, conditioning did not commence until June and those workouts were limited to strength training and agility work.
“We weren’t allowed to tumble or stunt or do basically anything on our mats at all so our conditioning was even limited in what we could do there,” coach Naomi Esparza said. “We did workouts in the weight room and outside for some endurance and agility training.
“It put a halt on a lot of the stuff we do over the summer such as choreography. As those restrictions were lifted toward the end of the summer, we were able to go to a choreography camp.”
GHS started to learn this year’s routine in August at a three-day camp. Cheerleaders got the most out of their time as each day meant nine hours on the mat.
“Because we missed the summer I wasn’t comfortable throwing them into a routine right away to go full out,” Esparza said. “As we’re seeing in a lot of high school and college sports and the NFL, I was afraid of injuries. We normally have all this preseason time for conditioning and we missed that this year. We were only able to meet in our small summer groups and couldn’t meet as a whole.”
While practices have returned to what is closer to normal, the team has dealt with some quarantine situations following COVID-19 guidelines. The team has not been fully in tact throughout the entire preseason.
“When you have a group of 13 like ours, it’s not like other sports where you can just sub someone else in,” Esparza said. “Each girl has a very specific role and that role is played by that individual so the ability to just switch in and out isn’t possible on a competition floor.
“They continue to have a good attitude with each new thing COVID-19 brings. They seem to have a keen ability to sort of laugh it off and make the best of it.”
When cheerleaders have been quarantined, they practice remotely through video software. They are able to stretch and perform jumps and concentrate on parts of the routine that are more individually focused.
“The extent of what they can do of course isn’t like being at practice,” Esparza said. “But it’s at least like they’re getting something.”
The season that typically begins in September was pushed back to Nov. 7. Gilmer will field a veteran squad this year led by six seniors.
“We have a lot of girls returning, which is nice to have a group that knows so much and has experience under their belt,” Esparza said. “This group of girls is unique. I was coaching these girls when they first came to high school and had the opportunity to work with them when they were just starting out sort of on a JV floor.
“These girls didn’t have any middle school experience so its nice to see them follow through and see them transform as they enter their senior year. This is a great group. They’re a really energetic group, there isn’t any stress and they sort of roll with the punches.”
Esparza believes stunting will be a strength of the team this year. As they have been able to work on their routine more, they have added advanced skills to get the team prepared for region.
“I think their attitude and talent as far as stunts go is really going to be a key part in the success of our season,” Esparza said. “I believe attitude beats talent any day, and I think that has been real apparent as they keep their stress levels in check.”
GHS made the move from Class 4A to 3A this season and Esparza is not sure what to expect. She will however get an idea throughout the season.
“3A goes before 4A (at state), and as a coach, I normally only saw what came after us, which was those divisions above us,” Esparza said. “Because we’re usually in a back holding area before our performance, I don’t know much about 3A.
“I think we’re in good shape as far as the region goes, and we have teams in our region who are definitely beatable. I think we will see that as the season progresses. We will see people from region at just about every competition. I’m excited about that because that will give us a good idea of our placement at region and state. ”
GHS began the season last Saturday in Dawsonville. Its next competition will be Dec. 5 at Cherokee Bluff, followed by Jan. 23 at Creekview before the region competition at Dawson Feb. 6.
A top four placement at region will be needed for GHS to make a return to the state competition.
Season under way
Gilmer opened its season last Saturday at Dawson County High School, and its performance had a bit of a hiccup.
A Gilmer cheerleader was injured mid routine, received emergency attention and taken to the hospital. Under those circumstances, routines are halted at the time the injury took place.
GHS cheerleaders came back at the end of the session and resumed the routine at the point where they stopped. They completed the routine the best they could being down a cheerleader. By default, some elements of the routine had to be omitted.
“Because one of our girls got hurt in one of our stunting sequences, we weren’t able to finish our pyramid and were limited to what we could do in the second half of our routine,” said Esparza. “Even with that, we still scored pretty well. I think that is hopeful and going to be good for us with where we are at the beginning of the season.”
The cheerleader is recovering and the injury is not believed to be as severe as originally thought, according to Esparza. GHS tallied 63.5 points on the day and could have scored up to 20 more if its entire routine was in tact.
Given the unfortunate circumstance, Esparza was pleased with how cheerleaders responded.
“They were definitely shaken up,” she said. “This was the first time this group of seniors had to stop mid routine because of an injury. They didn’t have any experience with that.
“They executed the second half of the routine really well, and I couldn’t have asked for anything else. That was impressive from a coaching standpoint. It was great to see those girls rally around her and finish strong.”