As with many sports, proper footwear is a must when it comes to cheer.
One of the most commonly asked questions that parents ask when they are signing up their athlete for their very first tumble class, is what the athlete should wear on their feet.
At minimum, what we recommend is a comfortable pair of sneakers for working out in that can be specifically dedicated to use in the gym.
In other words, a pair of sneakers that can be changed into when arriving to the facility and changed out of prior to leaving the facility.
Doing this minimizes excessive wear on the sneakers that can be compounded over time for a pair of sneakers which will already see plenty of use (depending upon how often the athlete ventures into the gym).
The need for proper footwear increases exponentially as an athlete becomes deeper involved within the programming we offer.
As one might imagine, we have athletes that are literally in the gym 5 if not more times per week.
Having this much use, it is important that athletes’ footwear is monitored and kept in good shape.
You perhaps may think that in a utopic world, every athlete would have 2 pairs of their competition shoes.
One pair worn for comp that they wear to practice at least once per week to make sure that they are properly broken in for comp, and one pair for the athlete to wear at all other times that they are in the gym each week practicing.
This would obviously cut down the chances of the competition shoes being prematurely worn out.
The reality of things though is that the overwhelming majority of athletes gravitate toward one pair of comp shoes which they immediately begin wearing to practice as soon as they are received, and they are worn between practice and competition until they are virtually disintegrating on the athletes’ feet.
During a recent season, an unintentional experiment was conducted within our program when one of our sneaker suppliers accidentally had an error on an order of custom sneakers and after making good on it (thank you sneaker company!) each athlete ended up with 2 pairs of competition sneakers.
Even though this was the case, the overwhelming preference seemed to be for the athletes to choose one of the 2 pairs and wear them all the time, keeping the other pair in their locker as a backup pair, but choosing to roll with one of the pairs throughout the season, whether at practice or at competition.
Maybe it is just an “athlete thing”, kind of like a football player choosing to wear the same t-shirt under their equipment to every practice or every home game.
Whatever the reasoning, it definitely was interesting to observe.
When chosen by the program for its athletes, there are many factors that go into choosing which sneaker to incorporate into a specific uniform cycle (in our program, we run with 2-year uniform cycles where every 2 years we reveal a completely new competition uniform).
Some of these factors include the weight of the sneaker, their appearance, and the nature of how they support the athletes’ feet whether they are a base, backspot, flyer, tumbler, etc.
No matter what sport you are taking part in, footwear should absolutely be paid attention to.
This is absolutely true for competitive cheer no matter if you are an athlete who comes into the gym independently for tumble classes or Private lessons or whose sneakers are chosen for them by the program as a whole.
