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Cheerleaders find success at Provincials

Three Yorkton cheerleading teams – the Youth Gridders, Senior Gridders and YRHS Raiders – travelled to Moose Jaw Saturday, March 21 for the ninth annual Saskatchewan Provincial Cheerleading Competition at the Moose Jaw Yara Centre.
Youth Gridders
The Youth Gridders put together a near perfect run on Saturday to take the Provincial championship in the Youth Level One All-Star category.

Three Yorkton cheerleading teams – the Youth Gridders, Senior Gridders and YRHS Raiders – travelled to Moose Jaw Saturday, March 21 for the ninth annual Saskatchewan Provincial Cheerleading Competition at the Moose Jaw Yara Centre.

All three teams represented the City of Yorkton exceptionally well with both the Youth Gridders and YRHS Raiders bringing home Provincial titles while the Senior Gridders were named runners up for the third consecutive year. “We’re extremely proud of all of the athletes that competed,” suggested cheerleading head coach Jennifer Ingham. “They all did so well and to have two firsts and a second at provincials, it’s amazing.”

The first Yorkton team to compete on Saturday was the Youth Gridders, made up of first-year cheerleaders ranging in age from eight to 11. The Youth Gridders, looking to improve upon their sixth place finish in Warman at their first ever competition, surprised and amazed everyone in attendance with an impeccable run resulting in a score of 84.4 out of 90 and a perfection percentage of 94.22%.

The run proved to be the best in the Youth Level One All-Star category resulting in the Youth Gridders taking home Provincial gold. “Their run was awesome. They had all of their stunts hit at the right times,” beamed Ingham when asked about the Youth Gridders’ performance. “They had tons of energy and they really performed. Their tumbling was higher than anyone else in their age division and they came out in first place.

“It was a big surprise for us but we’re very proud of the girls and it’s quite an accomplishment to be in your first year of cheerleading and to win a Provincial championship with all of them being first year athletes.”

The impressive performance by the Youth Gridders set the bar high for the second competing Yorkton team, the YRHS Raiders.

However the Raiders were more than willing to leap over the bar with a stellar performance of their own; something they did in the Senior Level Two Scholastic division en route to a score of 79.7 out of 85 and a sparkling 93.76 perfection percentage.

The Raiders were also the only team in their division to put together a clean run resulting in no deductions and the Provincial title. “It really is a big accomplishment to run a clean routine,” offered Ingham. “It’s hard to run it clean every time so we’re very proud of the fact that we were the only team to run a clean routine in the category.”

The first place finish is the third such finish in as many competitions this season for the YRHS team, something head coach Ingham never expected at the beginning of the season. “I think this is the first time that we’ve placed first in all of our competitions since I’ve been coaching the team. Certainly we’re very proud of that. It’s unexpected but we have worked really hard all year and that’s as good as we can do this year.”

The final Yorkton team to perform was the Senior Gridders team, made up largely of girls who also compete for the YRHS team.

Unfortunately the girls could not repeat their gold medal performance from earlier in the day finishing just behind the Prairie Fire Cheerleading Ignite team in second place with a score of 94.6 out of 100 for a 94.6% perfection percentage.

A deduction of .25% for a shaky stunt lowered their final score to 94.35%, still .55% better than third place RCA Marauders.

Up next

The next competition for the YRHS Raiders and Senior Gridders will be the Aloha International Spirit Championships in Honolulu, Hawaii, from April 3-4.

The Youth Gridders, meanwhile, will run their routine this coming weekend at the Springer’s Gymnastics Competition at the YRHS.