Welcome to UCA Cheer Camp, Days 1 + 2!
DAY 1:
Thank you all for getting the team to UC Davis on time! All the members got checked in, and were ready for a fun first day of UCA Cheer Camp!
On Day 1, the team learned a lot of material: sidelines, cheers and a few quick dances.
This cheer camp is split into TWO! There is a Traditional side of camp, and an Elite side of camp. NOTE: We are in the Traditional side of camp. There’s a lot of great teams here, traveling as far north as Oregon, and as down south as Los Angeles, CA. The UCA Instructors are also from various areas. The UCA Instructors are College Cheer Coaches from: SJSU, CSU-Sacramento, UC Berkeley, UC San Diego, Cal Poly-SLO. There is a lot of talent here at camp, and the girls are soaking it all in!
SIDELINE EVALUATION-GOLD RIBBON: SUPERIOR!
The team learned 2 sideline cheers within 10 minutes! Then we choreographed quick stunts within the sidelines, and had our first evaluation, all within 30 minutes!! The girls worked quickly to learn the motions, and were able to hit crowd effective sideline stunts. In the end, the team received their first GOLD SUPERIOR ribbon! Congratulations!
If the team receives all Superior ribbons (Gold or Blue) throughout all of their performances at Camp, they will receive a Superior-Game Day Trophy!! We’re off to a great start!
On Day 1, we also received our 1st Spirit Stick! Receiving a Spirit Stick means that the team has been rallying, having fun, and being friendly and energetic with the UCA Coaching Staff and other schools. Although Day 1 was a little overwhelming for the new members, they managed to keep their spirits high and win this award!
Internal to Westmont: Each night, us coaches (Kelly, Lauren, Amber), gives the Spirit Stick to one member on the team. This member is being recognized as someone that stood out to us personally on our team throughout the day.
For Day 1, we rewarded the Spirit Stick to Samantha Binns!! With having the Spirit Stick, that member then has to take “care” of our school spirit by being responsible for the Spirit Stick until the next day, when we have to return the Spirit Stick back to UCA. Then the process of being spirited continues for another day to hopefully earn another Spirit Stick.
DAY 2:
Today was a much more energetic day! The team started to understand the true essence of cheer camp, and really got themselves involved with being fun and crazy with the other cheer teams.
CHEER EVALUATION - GOLD RIBBON: SUPERIOR!
The morning portion was dedicated to fine-tuning the Cheer they learned on Day 1, adding stunts, signs, and poms. Erica Hadley worked hard with all of the motions on the ground- perfecting every motion, and having the girls smile and yell the words loudly. As for Stunts, all groups were having a bit of difficulty hitting stunts. Our UCA instructor had suggested a new transition to our Cheer Stunts, and although the members were trying hard to hit them, motivation was starting to fall. About 15 minutes before Lunch Break, we made a last minute change, with the very versatile Grace Rodhouse being able to stunt wherever and with whomever, and it seemed to make the stunts progress again. We broke for lunch, with the hopes of returning to practice more energized and refreshed. We returned to practice before our Cheer Eval with only 45 minutes to perfect the newly choreographed stunts. The team did AMAZING! And received their 2nd Gold Ribbon (Superior)!! We rewarded this Gold Ribbon to Grace, in appreciation of her can-do attitude and absolute core strength to make any and all stunts hit!
With the Cheer Evaluation complete, UCA Camp decided to have some members from all of camp (400+ cheerleaders) to show off their skills! Mia Davis got on stage and performed her hula dancing! It was a great performance and UCA staff even included it in their SnapChat feed for all UCA Cheerleaders to see around the nation! Very cute!
We ended the day with reviewing material, and enhancing our stunt pyramid for Day 3 (for the Rally-Dance routine). The Rally routine used be known as the Xtreme Routine. It is a dance, with a few 8-counts at the end to incorporate our pyramid we showed at the last Parent Meeting. We are working hard to use the incorporations UCA Staff is suggesting. <<Fingers crossed>>
Spirit Stick!
The team had such amazing spirit today! UCA Camp rewarded a Spirit stick to the Westmont Team, again! Yayaya! We as a Coaching team then rewarded the Spirit Stick to Ariana Rivera!! Ariana had to learn how to be the front center Sign girl for the Cheer! It was a huge responsibility to lead the crowd to say the words of the cheer and to be the first point of contact. Great job! She’s also expanding her stunting horizons from not only being a base, but a flyer, too!
Back at the Dorms…
We had the Room Decorations Contest tonight. Each room decorated their room with a theme of their choice, and us coaches judged each of their rooms to see who were the most creative and original.
The team had a lot of fun in showing off their rooms, and definitely made us coaches laugh. It took a while to get through all of the rooms, and by the time we were done, it was time for the members to be in their rooms, and no longer in the hallways. So the winner of the Room Decorations Contest will be announced tomorrow morning. :)