Blog 21: Independent Component 2

LITERAL
a) I, Priscilla West, affirm that I completed my Independent Component which represents 30 hours of work.
b) Rene Gonzalez - mentor and coach
c) Log of Independent Component 2 Hours
d) For my Independent Component 2 I completed 30 hours of work for The Summit, the most prestigious all-levels All-Star Cheerleading competition in the world. It's a competition for the top teams in the nation, and even being invited to go was a feat in itself. We had to qualify to even receive a bid to the competition. For my Independent Component 2, I competed in Florida at The Summit on May 4th and 5th, and my team placed 3rd. This means that I cheer on the third best small senior level 1 team in the entire United States.

INTERPRETIVE
This competition is the most prestigious competition for lower level divisions, such as my division, level 1, because teams have to qualify at a national competition and receive a percent of perfection score of 90% or higher on their routine to even be invited to attend The Summit. The Summit is a competition between the best of the best. Of the 20,000 plus All-Star Cheerleading teams in the US alone, only 350 teams attended The Summit to compete for the title of "The Best Small Senior Level One Team in the United States," or "The Second Best Small Senior Level One Team in the United States." There are of course multiple divisions, I just used my division as an example. Since my team was good enough to receive an at large bid to The Summit, at the end of the season when everyone was having their last practices and not focusing on improving so much but hanging out with their team for the last couple practices of the season, my team practiced their butts off for the month leading up to The Summit. We had two straight weeks of practice, weekends included. Our coaches focused on literally perfecting our skills since that is what The Summit is about, percent of perfection on your routine. They added more difficulty to our routine stunting and tumbling wise as well as gave us a completely new dance.

Old Dance (As of Sept, 2012):

Old First Stunt (As of Jan, 2013):

Old Second Stunt (As of Jan, 2013):

This is a video of my team's performance both days at The Summit
(With our new dance, first and second stunt):
Day One:
Day Two:

APPLIED
After our normal season was over, we still came to practice nearly every day for a month before The Summit. The normal All-Star season ends in the beginning of April, but The Summit took place on May 4th and 5th in Orlando, Florida, so my team worked harder than we had the entire season for the last month of practice while all other teams were enjoying their last practices together by hanging out and messing around. I had practice every day for two weeks before the competition, weekends included. Our coaches wanted to make sure we perfected our skills, so that what we took to The Summit was our absolute best. I was unfortunately nursing a back injury, so I couldn't tumble most of the time, but as soon as I was cleared to practice again, I made sure my backwalkovers were down perfect and that all my stunts hit effortlessly. The change in my skill level since the beginning of the season, my first competition, and my final performance at The Summit are drastic. Not only did I gain new skills during the season, I was able to perfect them. By attending the most prestigious competition a team in my division can attend and hopefully winning it or even placing, it'll show that there has been a drastic improvement of skills by not only me, but my team members, especially since 80% of the kids on my team have never cheered before this season. By attending this competition we therefore have to perfect every aspect of our routine and our skills as cheerleaders, which is progressing in itself.
My Independent Component 2 really reassured me of all of my answers, and especially my best answer, keeping a strong mentality, especially in tumbling and stunting. One of my teammates was really negative and unhappy during practice in Florida, and I personally called her out on it to her face. After telling her multiple times to snap out of it and get in the right mindset, I started to notice how it was affecting my team, and my coaches did too. Everyone else started losing that strong mentality that kept them motivated and pushing through how tired we were, and hungry, and sweaty. Everyone was giving up, and no one wanted to be there. So, we had a team huddle and I told people who needed to be told off that they needed to start focusing and being positive, keeping a strong mentality, because they were affecting others. I think me being very blunt and calling people out really woke everyone up, and they were all nodding along and being attentive, like they had finally realized what was going on. After that pep talk my team went back out there and hit our routines perfect.