Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: Freshman-Senior Varsity
Sport Played: Varsity Cheerleading
Your Story: I had a coach who would have us run and condition for a long period of time before having us run our routines. Her decision left us so tired that we were not sharp, which would induce more conditioning. The practice would follow right after school and be between 2-3 hours. After seeing us, the football team agreed that these workouts were tougher than theirs.
Our routines caused us injury because we were so tired from the conditioning. We would show up to finals bruised, broken, and limping and then she would ridiculed us if we did not come in first.
Eventually the love of the sport was lost. I think she saw “first place” as her only job while the rest of us saw it as an extra-curricular activity. To her, success was the trophy while for us, success was the experience of teamwork.