Tumbling coach, author and expert Debbie Love shares her advice for safe skill-building.

By Debbie Love

CBN Aug/Sep 2009

Tumbling has been in the forefront of the collective mind of the all-star cheer industry in 2009, from the creation of Level 4.2 and the innovative new passes seen at Worlds to the most talked about tumbling topic: improper form and the ubiquitous poorly executed double full. We hear the term “progressions” over and over again when it comes to tumbling, but how many coaches and athletes are putting in the time to work through them? Here’s why teaching tumbling progressions is vital to the safety and improvement of your athletes.

The Missing Layout

As all-star coaches, we’re sometimes too concerned with putting skills in a routine rather than building the bodies of our athletes. The focus seems to be on how many athletes we can make do a full or a double, but we must start with the basics. An athlete with a perfect layout will learn a full in no time, but there are athletes who not only never learned a layout but are actually doing doubles that are making them injury-prone every time they land because they didn’t build the necessary strength at the layout level. A double is a layout with two full twists—not a whip with two bent twists or an archy layout with the body twisting at different times. We don’t have to spend a year on every skill like in gymnastics, but there must be a standard of expertise at each level prior to advancing to the next one, and a layout is the basic skill for the remainder of our development in cheerleading. If an athlete isn’t strong enough to drive his or her back leg up in a round-off in order to do the layout correctly, then that athlete needs to condition and attain that strength instead of putting an already weak body at risk of injury.

Building Up

Impatience is a major problem in all-star tumbling—from the parents who want their child to have a full, the athlete who only wants to learn the flashiest skills, and the coaches who aren’t going through progressions in every area of cheerleading. I saw a Level 5 team that had a problem in one of their Baskets. While working with them, I learned they didn’t even know what a trophy drill was. When they did the drill, we discovered what the problem was in the more difficult Basket. It just proves that we really need to go from A to Z when it comes to skill-building.

The athletes in our gym stunt in the same progressions every time, with a purpose at each level—even our Level 5 athletes. When we tumble, everyone does forward rolls, backward rolls, handstands, cartwheels, round-offs and then progresses either forward or backward in tumbling. I know plenty of athletes who have a hard time with a standing back tuck because they can’t do the ending to the skill, which is a backward roll. My athletes don’t like it (impatience again), but they do a series of handsprings first, then round-off back handspring tuck, then round-off back handspring layout, then fulls, then doubles. I work with the University of Kentucky cheerleaders, and they go through the same progressions in running tumbling. I don’t allow any of them to skip the progressions, and every tumbling class includes drills for the particular skill the athletes are working on, as well as conditioning exercises they must do to get strong enough to perform the skill safely and properly.

Progressions and Injury Prevention

We must become responsible for our athletes’ safety not only in word but also in the process of developing their skills. Progressions are imperative for the safety of our athletes. It all leads back to strength building. An athlete who isn’t strong enough to do a double full will land with her legs crossed or not land at all. This puts the ACL at a great risk of tearing, and if an athlete twists while in a pike, it puts her back at risk for injury.

It’s also important to note that your stretching and flexibility program must be coordinated with the rest of your training, because lack of flexibility also leads to injury. Other parts of our body take over when one part is weak, creating imbalances that can cause injury.

As coaches, we must be diligent in analyzing our athletes’ strength in a way that is very specific to our sport. For example, athletes must have strong glutes and hamstrings to achieve the extension needed to do a back tuck. Not only that, but if they have weak plyometric skills, they won’t be able to get off the ground high enough to do the tuck. If the shoulders are not in the proper posture, they’ll be unable to get to the proper stretch necessary to do a safe, strong back tuck. And if athletes have a weak core, all their power is diminished.

If coaches don’t understand these things, they need to research it, get more training and ask questions of those who know. I talk to physical therapists all the time and spend a great deal of time on the computer researching these very issues because I want my athletes to have all the information they need to maximize their potential.

Must-Have Moves

Are your athletes having difficulty with a more advanced skill? Take a look at the building blocks: the handstand and the round-off. Every tumbling skill has a handstand of some type in the middle of it. I feel that a perfect handstand, which levers in and out, is absolutely necessary. All double and single fulls are related to the round-off, so a beautiful round-off is of the utmost importance. The round-off must lever in and out and have a straight plane from the fingers to the toes of the back foot all the way through. If these things don’t happen, you’ll have a problem with your ending skill. For almost every double with a problem, you’ll find the root of the problem is in the round-off. I do a round-off drill in every class I teach.

After the handstand and the round-off, athletes need to perfect a good back handspring that stretches through the shoulders, passes through a handstand and snaps down with arms by the ears and the body in one piece (as opposed to being a pike). Once these skills are accomplished, a standing back tuck must be attained, and after that a layout. Everything else depends on these basic skills.

Keeping Athletes Motivated Through the Baby Steps

It may seem daunting to keep your athletes focused and motivated during the early progressions. Try using progression lists that have incremental steps to reach, so when the athletes get their progress reports they can see improvement, keeping them motivated to learn more. It’s when there’s no obvious progress that they may have problems with motivation.

Rewarding progress helps—such as stickers for the young children. For older athletes, just the competition with one another (as long as they’re within their same general skill level) will keep them motivated. Excitement from the coaches when new progress is noted goes a long way toward motivating athletes of any level. Athletes respond well to the P.I.C. (praise, inform of the problem, correct the problem) coaching format. Praise something, even if it’s just their effort, but make sure you know the proper correction.

Mat Time

To keep your athletes safe, your routines clean and your scores high, don’t put anything in a routine that doesn’t hit five out of five times. If you put in an inconsistent skill, then the athletes may worry so much about it that they make mistakes in other areas. Athletes are better off knowing their tumbling skills will hit rather than questioning them.

Always look for new ways for athletes to understand what’s necessary for them to perform the skill. I stay up at night many times thinking of drills for a particular athlete, just to help him or her understand what the body needs to do. Always have a lesson plan in place and provide structure in everything you do in the gym. This is another big stride toward athletes’ safety.

You can order Debbie Love’s book/DVD set, For the “Love” of Tumbling, by e-mailing her at marcandluv@aol.com.

Love’s Recommended Tumbling Progressions

Front Tumbling Progession

1. Forward roll

2. Dive roll

3. Handstand

4. Handstand forward roll

5. Handstand front limber

6. Front walkover

7. Front handspring

8. Flyspring or bounder

9. Front tuck

10. Front handspring front tuck

11. Layout

12. Front twisting layout

You can teach front aerials anytime after athletes are at a good, solid Level 3.

Back Tumbling Progression

1. Backward roll

2. Backbend stand up

3. Back extension rolls with bent arms and then with straight arms

4. Backbend kickovers

5. Back walkovers

6. Back limbers

7. Back handspring

8. Back tuck

9. Layout

10. Full

11. Arabian

12. Whip

13. Onodi and other specialty passes or doubles

Be careful not to mix skills that are alike, such as fulls and Arabians. If you notice your athletes get mixed up, back down on the Arabian. Make sure the athletes own their skill autonomously before you teach another skill.

Sometimes when you begin teaching athletes a double, they forget their full. To separate the technique from the double, have them do their full across the width of the floor and keep their arms wide. Then have them do their double on the diagonal across the mat. Sometimes athletes with a new full will lose it if the whip is introduced too early. Both the whip and the Arabian are advanced skills needing a great deal of body control to perform.

Score Sheet Dilemma

Each season we hear the gripe from coaches and choreographers that score sheets sometimes seem to reward poor tumbling (i.e., if you land on your feet, you get the points regardless), which can motivate coaches to include those iffy skills in routines. What do you think? Sound off on forum.cheerbiznews.com.