PA Elite

In the early 1990s,cheerleading teams not associated with schools or sports leagues, whose main objective was competition, began to emerge. All-star cheerleading involves a squad of anywhere between 5-35+ females and/or males. The squad prepares almost year-round for many different competition appearances, but they only actually perform for up to 2½ minutes during their routines. The numbers of competitions a team participates in varies from team to team, but generally, most teams tend to participate in six or seven competitions a year. During a competition routine, a squad performs carefully choreographed stunting, tumbling, jumping and dancing to their own custom music. Teams create their routines to an eight-count system and apply that to the music so the team members execute the elements being performed with precise timing and synchronization.All-star competitive cheerleaders are placed into divisions which are grouped based upon age, size of the team, and ability level. Judges at the competition watch for illegal moves from the group or any of its members. Here, an illegal move is something that is not allowed in that division, due to difficulty and safety restrictions. More generally, judges look at the difficulty and execution of stunts and tumbling, synchronization, the sharpness of the motions in the dance, as well as the cheer (if applicable), and overall routine execution.