The Sports Social Podcast Network is delighted to be supporting this year's Sports Podcast Awards, recognising the sporting podcast at the top of their game. And now it's your turn to lend your support to your favourite sport podcasts. Voting is open now, which means you can get behind your favourite shows and show your appreciation for the hard graft they put in, keeping you entertained and informed on whatever sport it is you follow.
There are 21 categories to vote in, including football, tennis, golf rugby and loads more. And voting is dead simple. Head to sportspodcastawards.com, vote now and be part of the action.
Hello, it is Tom here with another classic episode of Things People Do. Now, this one is about cheerleaders, so I should begin it like this. Two, four, six, eight, who do we appreciate? Well, two cuts to the chase, we appreciate Will. A listener who spent five years as a cheerleader, and at the exact point that we recorded this was contemplating a comeback.
is cheerleading exactly what we thought it was? Probably not. This is one of our favourite episodes, partly because Will is an absolute legend, and partly, because Will and his friends came to our photoshoot when we rebranded the Germano show, as things people do, and put me on his shoulders, who was on top of someone else's shoulders, on top of someone else's shoulders, and I nearly died but I didn't, about cheerleaders.
Our guest today is Will. He's a listener. And for five years, he was a cheerleader. Well, it's hard to just come out with that line. I was going to come out with you're a man, but you know, people are different and could be whatever they want to be. I am a man indeed. Pronouns, he, he and him. Definitely almost said he and she then, which is very confusing, but no, he and him. That was really confusing. I got a cheerleader. I just presumed was a blonde,
female that had pom-poms. That's the stereotype I had in my head. What stereotype did you have, Tom? Exactly the same one. Exactly the same. Possibly a short skirt, American football, game, touchlines. I'm looking at you intently, Will. And you're a decent looking man. Got some nice arms on you as well. Thank you very much. Great head of hair as well. However, you're not what we just described. So please tell me more about how you're a cheerleader for five years. Dispel all our myths.
that we have of what a cheerleader is.
I'm going to be honest. I had exactly the same thoughts when I was told to go and do cheerleading for the first time. So unlike many male cheerleaders, I didn't actually start until I was at university. I'd never heard of it as a sport. I thought it was the same as what you see traditionally cheering on the sidelines of American football games, basketball games with pom poms, ridiculous outfits, dancing and just sort of yelling random words, letters, whatever happened. And I went to university.
And in my very first day, my freshers representative a second year was looking after me, said, Will, why don't you come and do cheerleading? And I just thought, why not? Let's give a few things ago. So my first week, I also tried out Ultimate Frisbee as well. And I tried a couple of other sports. And I went to this cheer session.
It turned up was one of two guys, the other guy being my roommate from university. So it's just us and a load of girls. And I can't describe how amazing it felt. And I was addicted within that one session. It just blew my mind, really, that how cool the sport was, the physicality of it, the fact that these women were so brave to let me pick them up and throw them and catch them with a group of other people. I wasn't just like partner-stunting straight off, just to hit it by myself.
And it just stuck from there in the entire three years at university from that very first week. I devoted pretty much everything to cheer, which was a sentence I never thought I'd say. We have watched Joe some footage of cheerleading, the modern sort of cheerleading. He's mind blowing, isn't it? It absolutely blew my mind. In fact, I didn't see a pom-pom once in all the bits that I watched. This was some of the biggest stunts and biggest flips and biggest pyramids that were built. And I was like,
How the fuck are they doing all of this? And you've only got like a short amount of time, haven't you? Is it two minute 15? Yeah, so slight variations, but in the group competitions that you saw on the Netflix series cheer, they compete for two minutes and 15 seconds.
In the UK, some competitions we did with two minutes, 30 seconds. So that's in a big group and you've got three different elements in which you're trying to hit, but then also there are other types of cheer as well. So there's what's called a group stunt, which is a routine that's 75 seconds long and is purely just a group of three or four of you just throwing stunts for that 75 seconds. And then you've also got partner stunts as well, which is literally one base and one flyer again for about 75 seconds, throwing nothing but stunts.
which is, it doesn't sound like a long period of time, but a minute and a quarter, just throwing stunts is so, so tiring. It's mental and to think that I used to do that and actually I'm thinking of coming out of retirement because in preparation for the show, I got so excited. I was like, I miss it so much. It's mental. It's a ridiculous sport. It's so intense and physical and watching it, you're like, on the edge of your seat, scared.
Fuck, they're going to definitely drop that person. They drop it. No, how are you doing that many flips? How are you doing that? But also so entertaining with how you're keeping it in time, all the dance moves, all the different steps. I was just loving it. I think we need a bit of explanation here, Will. So you've talked about bass and flyers. What do they do?
So, in cheer, in a stunt routine, there are four different positions. So, the Flyer, easily the most difficult, complex, the skill level is unbelievable, the amount of things they have to do. They're the person that is being thrown and caught, but it's not just as simple as letting people throw you. You've got to perform twists in the air, flips, all of these sorts of things. Your core strength has to be so on point and you have to be so
balanced as well so as you see in some of the routines that they do in cheer that they start it so the the bases holding them with their arms the bases arms above the head they're doing a handstand they then get pushed up and have to put their feet in the exact position that the head was the base can catch them like stuff like that it's just
The fact that these people can do that is unbelievable, and Joe, your face just shows how mind-blowing it is. I don't know how some of these moves are done at all. Would I be a flyer? Are you looking at me like I'm a flyer? Anybody can be flown. Are you sure about that? I've been flown. I mean, I'm not a rugby player. I am heavy. I'm just about to correct, not correct you, but bring up the fact that although you've been thrown, I would struggle to believe that you were anywhere near 127 kilos.
Not quite there, but you could be flown at what is called base level, I believe. So you would have two bases, one on each foot and a back supporting you, and you could stand up at a base level, I believe, because if you have people strong enough and if you were able to sense your weight properly and put your weight in the right places, you could do it.
I fancy it. I've got this. I don't got this. I definitely don't have any centre of core or whatever it is I needed to send them away. I couldn't do that. I'd fall ass over to it.
Would you probably like to watch that, wouldn't you? Very much so. But if he's not going to be a flyer, Will, could Joe be an excellent bass? Joe would be the perfect bass. So you've got two basses, generally, in a group. The first is the main bass. And this is the bass that stands on the flyer's strongest side. So most flyers are right-footed. So they put their right foot into a stunt first. They take the weights. They are the load-bearing bass. Their main job is to be the grunt, the throwing, the catching, taking most of the weight.
You then have a second base, which is more of a technical role. So they will take the second foot and they are more involved in directing where the feet, they're helping the fly to direct where the feet should go in the twists and tumbles and things like that. And then you have finally what's called the back spot as well. The back spot is there mainly to keep count. So you're keeping count throughout the routine there, the voices that you'll hear on the mat. They're also there for stability as well to stop the fly from falling forwards or backwards to help get elevation in the stunts.
I'm hearing all this stuff from Will and I'm seeing injuries. I'm not saying that's a result of your levels of expertise, Will. It just sounds dangerous. Yeah, cheer is a very dangerous sport. I think there's been some... Most of the studies on injuries have been done in America, but I think it's between 1982 and 2007, 65.1% of injuries that happened to high school females were from cheerleading. In terms of the
the number of catastrophic, I'm not quite sure, catastrophic injury is if that's like a broken leg or if that's death or I'm not quite sure. But in terms of the number of catastrophic injuries in high schools in America, it's the number one sports, it's number one cause on average one person died a year in the US doing cheerleading was in 1991 to 2015. The concussion rates are very similar if not higher to American football as well.
It's a dangerous sport and you do well as a cheerleader to avoid getting injured in some form or another throughout the season. Have you ever dropped someone and led to an injury or have you just ever dropped someone? Period.
Sometimes the fly hits the floor, sometimes with the way the stunts going, they can't help but fall forwards and sometimes a fly will hit the floor. I don't personally ever remember a flyer injuring themselves as a result of me dropping them. But is that because of the lengthy concussions that you've had yourself that you've actually chosen to
forget any dangerous instance that you've caused someone else. There are a few days that I genuinely can't remember because of the concussions I've had because of the year. Yeah, there was a period so I had three concussions due to cheer and my second one there was a period of about 12 weeks where I was exhibiting symptoms for and there are chunks of time in that that I don't recall what happened. Like I was with it on those days but I can't remember
what happened like going back. This has really dispelled the stereotype that we had, hasn't it? Straight away off the bat, fuck, this sport is real. The fact that it's a sport, first of all, it's not just, are we here to, in fact, actually, is it still used alongside sports teams as part of a cheer as well, as a cheer routine, as well as being its separate sport?
not so much in this country. In this country, especially at club level, it's mainly used just as a competitive thing. You train to go to competitions and compete in America and in other countries. They do a bit of both.
As a university team at Durham, where I was at, we did, in my first year on the university team, do some sideline stuff for the American footballers. But I point blank, I was like, I'm not doing this. I'm not here to cheer for other people. I'm not here to stand at the side on a cold November afternoon. We're in these really skimpy outfits that boys and girls wear. I'm not here to do that. I'm here to compete. I'm here to throw people. And I hate the idea of standing
next to the sidelines and cheering people on and fortunately in the UK we don't do that anywhere near as much as in America.
What about being kicked in the balls? Is that an occupational hazard? Oh, yeah. There's a frequent hazard, especially if you're doing partner stunts. So if you're standing there, often getting to a prep level, so where the person is standing on your hands at shoulder level, and it's just the one flyer and the one base, you're standing behind them. They're jumping up and you're lifting them from the waist, throwing them in the air and catching them. But quite often, when a flyer is new to doing that, they'll want to swing their feet backwards.
And so in the getting up to that level, they will kick you in the balls. And the worst injury I've had in terms of ball related, it's not the most serious injury I've had, but it's the most bizarre injury. We were doing a stunt practice session and it involved
the flier sort of being at prep level, which is, again, sort of their feet are at our shoulder height. We throw them up in the air and her, she was aiming to do a full down, I believe, which is one twist in the air and then land on her back and we catch her. For some unknown reason, it went horrifically wrong. Her feet came towards me and she two footed me in the balls, which at the time was incredibly painful. And this happened in about April. And then for the next two months, I kept getting twinges.
in one ball in particular. But it wasn't, I didn't really think anything of it. I was in on a family holiday in Cornwall and I went body boarding with my family and being my height when you're out in the sea, a lot of the waves are crashing into me at sort of waist level and slightly below. We've had this body body session, came back, I was showering and I got out of the shower and I was like, something doesn't feel right, it's really painful. And then over the next five minutes, got more and more painful, but I was like, this is really embarrassing.
because I'm with my parents and my sister. So I went downstairs. My dad had cooked a barbecue for lunch. I ate the barbecue in complete sight. I was just thinking, I want to go upstairs and just lie down and go to sleep. My mom then comes upstairs and says, Will, what's the matter? I was like, I'm not talking to you. I'll only talk to dad. And at this point, I was like, my testicle. I mean, I mean, agony. At the time, I thought I had testicular torsion because it was that painful.
genuinely I could barely move, like the pain was like going from a testicle right up into my stomach. And I ended up going to urgent care. And the doctor who saw me, she was a female, she said, you know, are you particularly worried that it's a female doctor? And at the time, I didn't care. And she was like, okay, put the mat on you to cover yourself.
And I just remember lying back on the bed, like, trousers down by me because I had this protective mat on, so just my balls were hanging out. And this female doctor turns around, and the first thing she says was, oh my, that is swollen, isn't it? Oh, fuck. Yeah. Which is not what you want to hear. And it turned out that I had an infection called Epi Didymitis.
And her next question to me was, basically, have you had any unprotected sex recently? And I was like, that's at the time, that's physically impossible. That could not have happened. And she said, OK, I've tested your urine as well, and you don't have a urinary tract infection. This infection is 80% of the time caused by an STD, 15% of the time caused by a UTI, and less than 5% of the time caused by trauma.
And then I told her about the cheerleading and I've been having twins in it for two months and she was like, yeah, you probably injured it then. And then the infection has come to set in and then the bodyboarding has re-injured it. And you've got this lovely swollen testicle. Oh, God.
treatment, course of antibiotics for a week, and then subsequent cheering sessions, wearing a cricket box to protect myself, just in case, because she said, don't let it happen again, because you could lose it next time. Do you ever go back and go to the person that two footed you in the dick? Oh, she's my best mate. Brilliant.
That's what you do, is that you form the strongest bonds by doing dick kicking. I was going to go with the craziest shit. I would go straight with dick kicking if you like, but it was technically not cracking. Fucking occupational hazard. That's what really put me off. It's doing it.
It's certainly the most bizarre injury I've ever experienced, but I've experienced them. I've seen and personally had some horrendous injuries from it as well. My most serious injury, which my parents I'm sure will hate me telling this, but I almost broke my neck doing cheer, but it was entirely my own stupidity. So we decided as the end move of our routine,
that the six foot five bloke was going to jump and sit on my shoulders. What? I'm five foot seven. Why? We thought that was a good idea. I'll never know. Well, you know, if you pull it off, it's quite impressive. We did it a good number of times, but on a wooden floor on like judo mats, which just don't give the spring.
We went to this competition and I vividly remember him saying to me on the warmup map, which is like a sprung floor, which is what we compete on a gymnastic floor. He said to me on the warmup map, I don't want to do the impose on warmup because I don't want to end you. Right. It then gets to the end of the routine and he jumps on my shoulders and the momentum.
was so much greater because he'd been jumping off a sprung floor. As soon as he landed on my neck, I just got this searing pain from the top of my neck all the way down to my shoulder blades, just like straight down the center. And it's just this all mighty cracking as well. And I just remember hitting the floor, screaming and shouting, I wrestled him off me because he actually stuck the landing actually stuck. So I had to wrestle him off me in the process I broke his foot as well by doing that.
And I was lying on the floor and they got me motionless. There were some John's ambulance people there, but they weren't finally trained. So they couldn't move me, so they just had to hold me in position until the ambulance arrived. At that exact same moment, there was a massive pile up in the centre of Newcastle, which is where we were competing.
So I was just lying there on this mat, unable to move for approximately three hours before the ambulance turned up. And then eventually the paramedics arrived and they put up a big sheet around me. And they went off to complete the rest of the competition in the warm-up mat because they were still allowed to compete. But I didn't realize because I was sort of in and out of it. I wasn't really aware of what was going on. Everybody had come back in. So the paramedics come. They have to chop off my uniform, which is cost.
120 pounds and I've worn it for about 35 minutes before I got injured. Then all of a sudden they take the sheet down and I've just got these three and a half thousand people cheering me as I'm being wheeled like in a neck brace motion person topped us through this hole and the paramedic stopped and said if you don't give them a wave I'm not taking you out of here. You've got to milk this opportunity.
We then get to hospital and I get to CT and x-ray and I have like these four very young attractive radiographers and I'm like, oh, right, topless, the cheerleader. Perhaps, you know, they like the look of me or something. But what I'd forgotten was it is part of my routine and my preparation. I put purple glittery war paint lines on my face.
as part of my look for the day. So I was thinking, oh, perhaps I'm in here while I'm having my neck x-rayed and CT to check it's not broken. It turned out they just wanted to see the male cheerleader with glittery lines on his face. Out of the two, I would probably take the neck over the ball, if I'm honest.
At the time, I definitely would have taken the balls because thinking you've broken your neck is horrendous. It's horrifying. And I got a proper bollocking from my parents guy at the next day because we didn't come to watch because it was a new castle when they lived down south.
Did they, after that, be like, well, you're not cheering anymore. This isn't for you, mate. So that was in my final year at uni. So I said, I'd get to the end of the year, and then I give up. I then joined another club, and then I retired in 2019. But in preparation for the show, doing all my research, going back over all my old videos, I was like,
I really miss it. And then I've come across a squad in London, which is adults only. Looks quite cool and looks professionally run. So I've signed up for tryouts, which I still need to break the news to my parents. Whoa. I don't think I want to be there when you tell them I'm afraid. No. Your parents are definitely not letting that happen. If you go, I'm a fucking grand man, I would do what I want.
I can relate somewhat to like chucking people up in the air. I can relate to getting kicked in the balls quite a lot if they're not used to going up in the air so they kick their feet back because they're like panicking about going higher than how they're actually standing. And there has been the occasional time where I've lost a couple of thumbs here or there. Awkward moments in cheer is that that's got to be a thing, mate, because you're chucking loads of people in loads of different positions.
and it's not always going to land perfectly. Yes, you have to get used to the awkward moments. You have to forget about sort of intimate boundaries and stuff like you're going to grab people in awkward places. So again, my best friend who was the one that kicked me in the balls, a few months before that had happened, we were doing a stunt in which she landed on her front. And as she landed on her front, somebody you'd normally try to put your arm sort of just underneath the chest and catch them. For whatever reason, I got it very wrong.
position my hand perfectly to be cupping her breasts. And I panicked in that moment because I was like, this is so awkward. She's my best mate. And I'm literally cupping her breast right now. I've got to grab somewhere else. So I moved my hand and instinctively moved it to a neck and started. So you went and then groping her to strangling her. And then we came off the mat afterwards and she was like, well, what were you doing? What are you trying to strangle with? I was on your breast and she was like, I didn't notice.
Nice. But so much of this, from the way you've described it, the danger, the injuries, and the difficulty of it will, so much of this has got to come down to trust, surely. So how do you build that trust with someone? The fact is that you very, very quickly are in your stunk, like when you first join, you're thrown into stunts in the first session. So you're essentially putting your lives in each other's hands, and that
forms a bond in a way I've never experienced anywhere else before you have to trust these people because if you don't trust them you won't fly with them it won't be successful and that is when it's really dangerous is when you don't trust people because you won't throw yourself into the stunt you won't fully commit and it's the same in anything often if you go half-assed into things that's when you're more likely to get injured. How would you be in that situation Joe? Trusting.
I'd be more worried about the person that is trusting me because I wouldn't trust myself to actually hold to that or catch that person or I would struggle harder about trying to make them feel at ease. I guess you've got to spend two or three hours every couple of weeks together and you're like building up that trust and that rapport for that to work. I don't really like spending too much time worrying about just catch people who drop fucking 20 foot from the sky.
I don't think I could do it, mate. Would you let me throw you up in the air and then drop you? I'd let you throw me up in the air, wouldn't you, to drop me? No, no, like, drop yours and then catch me. Yeah, I probably would, because I think you are. Already you're doing that sort of thing. You're physically strong enough. So I probably would, actually. Mental. Is that a mistake? You're absolutely bonkers. Don't do that, because I'm dropping you every time. Mainly because I'll sit on the camera. And it'll be fine. British cheerleading compared to American cheerleading.
Are you going to be biased and say British cheerleading is much better? No. No. No. The origins are very mixed. The Americans will argue they started cheerleading in terms of the actual standing on the sidelines and cheering. The British will argue that we started it. But in terms of the stunt cheerleading, the competitive cheerleading, that was an American who started it called Lawrence Herkema. And I think Herkema is how you pronounce it because the jump that's named after him is called a Herke. Herke.
How does that jump look? I've never really done one, so I couldn't tell to be honest. It's a little bit too advanced for me. I'll probably disclaimer that I should have thrown in earlier. The guys you see on the cheer program, I could probably hit most of the stunts they pull. I could not do the jumps or the tumbling. They are the best in the world.
That college Navarro and Navarro are either two colleges on that program. They are the elite of the elite in the in the world Yeah, they're like the mecca of yeah, they're level seven and and then some there they're unbelievable It says you've won two British championships, but when applying for this show you said it's easier than it sounds is that you just Playing it down and no unfortunately not so they're just one team is there
Yeah, that's why you won it now. So I have won two British Championships on at least one occasion, if not both. We were the only team in that category because there are so, so many different categories available. So just, for example, at the USAF and ISAF Worlds, which is like the biggest club tournament, there are 29 different world titles you can win.
So, any cheer event, there are 30, 40 plus titles. What categories, how do you define the categories? Is it like boxing where you've got super flyweight, flyweight, featherweight, super featherweight, fuck a heavy weight, other weight, middle weight, hay weight, what's it, hay weight?
Bantamweight? Bantamweight cruiser. What defines the different subjects? So, in cheerleading, there are seven different levels of cheer. So, the level, as the name suggests, levels one through to seven. And that determines what level you're competing at, determines what stunts you can pull off, how many twists you can do, how high you can lift someone, braced and unbraced. And so, that's with some support or not some support, that sort of thing.
And at the World Championships, the big club ones, which is not part of the cheer series, but those people on that documentary would have competed at the world. You can be at levels five, six and seven. So there they are, the elite categories. And then you've got
So you've got level five, you've probably got four or five level fives, because then it depends on the size of your group as well. So you've got like extra small group, which is just eight people in your team. Then you've got a small, which is 12, and then you've got medium, 16, large, 20, and extra large, 24. So that's numbers on your team. You've then got, yeah, different ages as well. There are youth and there are adults. There's so many different categories. And that's part of the reason why it's yet to be
common Olympics sport, it's got IOC funding and IOC status, but because it's so all over the show, there are so many different categories. How do you choose which ones go to the Olympics? That's crazy that you've got 29 different categories. The way you've described it all, it can't be long before the Olympics actually go. This is a serious sport. This is something that we need to throw into the Olympics because it's just incredible.
Yeah. One day, I imagine we'll probably see cheer at the Olympics in some form or another. I don't think with 29 gold medals on offer, I think they might limit it slightly. But yeah, that seems to be the way it's going. And someone who loves competing and loves watching people compete and loves the sport, it would be amazing to see it on that stage. But only when it's ready. I don't want it entering now when it could look a bit of a mess.
Watch out, I'm gonna leap onto your shoulders, we'll have some ads and we'll come back.
Those are the ads. I want to know what I would get marked down for. How do you actually get marked in this cheer? So a cheer score sheet will compose sort of three main elements. So your first is your, what they're called, building skills. So these are your stunts.
So again, there are three different types of stunts. You've got your partner stunt or your group stunt. So that's when you're in your groups, as I mentioned earlier, of two to four people when you're throwing various stunts at two legs, a flyer is standing on two legs, or they're on one leg, and you put together a sequence and a routine in that section.
You've then got basket tosses, which is when you're literally creating a basket between the bases hands. So my right hand would go on my left wrist, my left wrist would then grab the opposite wrist and they've got the same. So we're essentially forming sort of a weave basket.
We're then throwing the flyer as high as possible and they're performing certain stunts. And then the final thing that you're getting marked on in the building section is the pyramids, which is the most complex part of the routine. It's the bit of the stunting that you want to look the best. So that's just your building skills. That's your stunting. You then got your tumbling, which you're marked on. So these are tumbles that you've done from standing, black flips and all those sorts of things. You've then got running tumbles.
Again, the sort of backflips, but you're running across the mat and doing a longer sequence, which they're just incredible what they do. And then you've got your jumps as well. And then finally is your routine. So your marks and your overall choreography, the way it's composed, the way it looks on the mat.
So let's say Joe and I are competing, Will, what sort of outfits are we wearing? It depends. The tradition used to be sort of quite loose fitting for men, quite loose fitting, fairly baggy, like short, sleeved as you probably sort of associate more with old style American cheerleading for the men. Nowadays, they're all like pursuits, very slim fitting, very tight, don't really hide much, including in your genitalia areas as well. For the girls,
really is a mixture so some of them wear crop tops so quite short skirts and skirts with a crop top so there you can hold their midriff and some compete in tops that come all the way down and some compete in all body suits as well.
From a basis perspective, we prefer to have our hands straight onto skin, and this sounds quite dodgy when you phrase it like that. But we prefer it because there's more friction on skin than there is in holding the clothing, and skin isn't going to ride up unless you've got a bit of a problem, whereas clothing does. And then also with a fly as legs, we will tell them in the two weeks leading up to performance to not shave their legs for two weeks, because which is a very weird conversation to have.
You stubbly legs, again, are easier to grip. So from my perspective, that's great. We tell the flight, the area of the, not like really long because then that's quite soft again. So like the stubbly legs and the stubbly legs are the best. We tell them not to moisturize or fake tan two weeks leading up to a performance because again, we want the legs to be as grippy for us as possible. And then you can be marked down as a cheer squad. If you're not all, like if your hair isn't all the same, if your makeup isn't all the same, you get marked
That is part of the market as well. How you look, how you address. You've got to be all the team has got to look the same. I mean, for men, it's slightly different. I've never been told to shave off my beard for a cheer routine, but I've competed with people who don't have beards. But in terms of the girls, especially their hair, the nails as well, they can't have fake nails that come across the edge of their finger. They're not allowed to have painted nails. You have clear nails.
We always tell the flights not to have long nails as well to stop them from scratching us, but I think do I agree that you lose marks for how for not necessarily looking all the same? I don't think that's right personally, but that's the way Cheer is at the moment as well. And another thing you can also lose marks for in Cheer is if you have inappropriate clothing or dancing.
So if you're dancing... What qualifies as inappropriate clothing? If this is me, like a gimp suit or something. That would be highly inappropriate. If the skirt's too short, if you're showing too much in that area, and you can also lose marks for provocative dancing as well, especially because there's a lot of children that compete. If you're having dance moves that are deemed to be too raunchy, you will lose marks as well. That's my fifth U-Jo that's the chat you'd fall into.
pure raunch. My sludge drop wouldn't be allowed. I think you'd be a one hit off. You could do it and then that would see you banned for life. What about a death drop? Which is, it's where you're standing up and you bend one leg back and you just fall back. Never heard of a death drop. As in like the splits. No, no, like, you just fall back. Sounds amazing.
I want to talk music, Joe. I want to know what sort of tunes will work really well for routines and which don't. And the way we're going to do this, Joe, is you're going to give us a song from your mental bank. And will, can you give us a yes or a no? Whether it will work for a cheer routine, please, Joe, go.
Bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum, bum
heaven he's my brother oh sorry but set fire to the rain watching birds it touch your face
I know you love Adele, but I don't think a single Adele song would work unless it was severely remixed.
That could work, that would work. Oh, I like that. So it has to be upbeat music. Yep, so as cheerleaders, we do everything in counts of eight. So you'll hear on a map, we'll start on five at the start of routine five, six, seven, eight, and then one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, and we'll just repeat that over and over again. So every track we pick has to be in two, four, or eight time. So the go-to example I always use is let me entertain you by Robbie Williams. That was my sort of signature track that I would include in any cheer.
Okay, I think about you Joe, but I'm loving Will's love of cheer and his passion, his passion for it. Every word you've spoken about cheer, like your face has been lit up. You've come prepared with all the different notes of any questions that we did ever. You're just so passionate about this sport, but you touched on when you first got into it.
You thought, oh, I'll give it a go, try it out. But what did you actually then get out of it? What then made you go, I fucking love this? Was it the physical nature, the actual competition of it? Tell us why you got a lot out of it. Are we prepared to get quite deep and meaningful? Is that all right? We get whatever we want on AM8, we get fruity, we get deep, we get light, we get dark, we get
I was going to say, laid. Never so far. Could be a first. Anyway, yeah, we do what you want, mate. So I've come from a team sport background. I played football, rugby, cricket, a lot as a kid. And I never really felt, and at school as well, I never really felt like I fitted in. I didn't
enjoy school and academically I did fine it wasn't anything you know to write home about but I did I did okay but I never felt like I fitted in and I don't know if you guys have experienced or anyone listening but sometimes kid they're kids in the year that sort of like the whipping kids of the year that the one everybody seems to know their business the one that everybody can take the mic out of for whatever reason that I would end up being one of those those kids in my year and
It allowed, oh, it didn't allow me to, but I withdrew into myself quite a bit. I am now by nature very closed off and reserved, which I've desperately tried not to be talking to you guys because...
But also that cheer brings that passion out in me and I went to cheer and by being in that group where people trusted me, people actually likes me for the fact that I could do cheer and they felt safe in that environment with me was an amazing feeling and being part of a group that really trusted me was great. I had a chat a couple of days ago with one of my closest friends who I did cheer with and she turned around and said, yeah, well, what a first met you. I thought you were a bit of a dick.
Yeah. And she said, that hasn't changed, though, she said. But she said, no, it wasn't that. It was, you were very reserved. And I just thought you didn't like anyone. And you weren't opening up. And she said, over that first term at university, she saw how much I changed, how much warmer I got towards people, how much more willing I was to open up to them. And it was just like being part of a family of most of my closest friends that I've got. I have cheered with in some form or another because
I've kept those people close to me because I felt good that they trusted me and I was able to trust them. Any Mickey taking, I knew was not genuine and knew was just joking and banter and also then to get slightly deeper, but cheer also, this is a strange sentence, but cheer also allowed me to realise that I had mental illnesses as well.
in my second year at university within two weeks of each other. I had two different conversations with two friends, both of whom had come to me about relationship issues they were having, which was highly ironic because I'd never been in a relationship at this point. I didn't know what I was talking about, but they saw me as a shoulder to cry on which was amazing and I just wanted to help them in any way I could. Both of these conversations ended up
becoming about me and then talking to me and I vividly remember one of them who's still a good friend of mine now saying, well, it's so difficult to be around you because you're so on edge. I'd never feel like you're relaxed. You're always anxious. You're always looking over your shoulder. You're always worrying. And I at this point thought I got a lot better at opening up, letting people in being a bit more chilled. And it turned out that
I just got a little bit less worse at it. And then the other, the other friend, I just was talking to her and explaining some of the things that were going on in my head at the time. And she just turned around and said, well, you know, this isn't normal, right? You know, no one else has these feelings, these thoughts, these emotions. So I had those two conversations with a fortnight of each other. And then that allowed me to have the confidence, I guess, to go and seek help. And I have after a 10 minute consultation, I was diagnosed with severe, generalized anxiety disorder and depression.
which I understood the anxiety. That's something I've been with retrospect suffering with since I was seven years old. I've been having a lot of panic attacks. I've had hundreds of panic attacks to the point at which I learned how to hide them from people because I found them so embarrassing.
And I was taken by my mom to see a GP at the age of nine because my mom thought I was developing an eating disorder because after every hot meal I ate, I would have a panic attack. But it turns out that I didn't like the feeling of being full or the feeling of having wind and that made me panic like what's going on inside my own body. And then that led onto severe anxiety and a lot of other areas in my life socializing. I don't drink because I don't like the feeling of out what alcohol does to me.
And then I, but I understood that what I didn't understand was the depression and this is still the wrangle I have in my head every single day and that I've grown up with an amazing family to the best parents you could ever have. An amazing sister, I've had good education, I've had good opportunities. I did have a lot of bullying at school, but with what most people suffer,
It's nothing, it doesn't matter. So, you know, in my own head, I still have those conversations every day. I've like, what have I done to almost earn the title of being depressed? But to actually have someone turn around to me and say that, I was then able to reflect on my life and look back and think, yeah, I first started suffering from depression at the age of 11 when I went to secondary school and these sorts of things. And that was when I was 20, when I was diagnosed, I'm 27 now, I'm still working my way through it, had a very, very bad
period between September 2020 and September 2021. But because I knew I was on well, I knew what to do, I knew how to seek help, I knew what to do it. And I knew how to live my life and get through it and come through it a different person. But if it wasn't for cheerleading, if it wasn't for those two conversations I had, it could have been so much harder, so much different. And I will forever owe those two people and the sport, just everything, because they've allowed me to realize how much of a
difficult adolescence I had because of my own mental health. I would be able to reflect on that and now think about how I can make things better going forwards. And yeah, as I said, I'm indebted to the sport and that's why I love it so much because I enjoy the competitive nature of it. I love throwing and catching people. The adrenaline buzz is incredible, but also it's allowed me to be
God, I'm trying to say something really, really wanky, but it's allowed me to be the wankier. The better is actually motto. It's allowed me to actually be who I am. I'm very, very different in the cheer environment than I am in any other environment, apart from with my family. I'm quite cheeky. I'll take the piss. I'm very happy to be sassy and do all the dropping there for the hip, the sassy moves, the blowing, the kisses to the judges, all of those sorts of things. But I'll only ever do that in a cheer setting.
outside of that I won't do it but cheer gives me that place where I can feel like I can be me and that's why when you know coming preparing for the show I was like I haven't been able to do that for three years I've been really really unwell for that one year period that I mentioned and I just want to go and have fun again for a year two years
And I missed the sport so much. I mean, I might not even get on, but just the fact that I've signed up to try out, so it's just getting me buzzing, I've trying to get some sort of flexibility back in the last few days, because I've lost it all. And I'm just excited, which is a nice feeling to have. And it's a very long-winded answer. I think you're absolutely fucking brilliant.
the passion at which you've spoken about cheer, the way you've held yourself the entire time that you've been here, the research that you've put into it, the effort that you've put into it to come in here and talk to us and then to share your story, the deeper, the darkest parts of your story, I'm grateful for that, I'm grateful to you for doing that and I've loved sitting here listening to how much you love it and you have to get back into it mate, you have to get back into it because the way your face lights up
at the prospect of doing it again. And the way you've spoken about how much it empowered you to be who you wanted to be, to be the person that you'd always sort of suppressed or hid away because you didn't want to be judged outside of it all, but cheer enabled you to come out of that shell. You got to get back involved, mate. You got to do that. I think it's absolutely brilliant. And I know Thomas as well that grateful to come on here and share your story like that, because it would definitely help others out there that are feeling the same.
No, thank you for giving me the opportunity and I'll make sure to tell my parents and anyone who doubts that I want to get back into cheer that Joe Marl has given me permission. Oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. That backfired really, really quickly. There was a disclaimer somewhere about parents not being able to contact me if it goes to itself. It's not my fault, please. Well, it's been fucking brilliant. Thank you, mate. No, thank you. Loved it. Loved the show. Keep doing what you're doing. It's brilliant. Thank you very much. Talk, man. Thanks, Will. Cheers, Will.
Here I told you to deny Will what a man. We engage with this story I hope you did too. Join us next time for another classic things people do. Crowd network a place where you belong.
This podcast is part of the Sports Social Podcast Network.
The Sports Social Podcast Network is delighted to be supporting this year's Sports Podcast Awards, recognising the sporting podcasts at the top of their game. And now it's your turn to lend your support to your favourite sport podcasts. Voting is open now, which means you can get behind your favourite shows and show your appreciation for the hard graft they put in, keeping you entertained and informed on whatever sport it is you follow.
There are 21 categories to vote in, including football, tennis, gold, rugby and loads more. And voting is dead simple. Head to sportspodcastawards.com, vote now and be part of the action.
