Is Cheerleading a Sport?

For me, a former collegiate and professional cheerleader, the answer is yes! Since the inception of cheerleading in the late 1800’s the question of whether or not cheer is sport has always been debated. The critics of cheerleading tend to discredit it as sport because of its format. Typically, sporting contests are between two teams that go head-to-head in either quarters, halves, innings or periods which specific, concrete objectives to outscore the other team.

Sports team will practice, compete weekly (sometimes multiple times a week) and move up and down in rankings throughout the season with the aspirations of winning the championship title. Cheerleading on the other hand, specifically allstar cheerleading, does not follow such a format. Although competitive allstar cheerleaders practice and compete multiple times a month, competitions may vary in format, scoring and structure. The lack of continuity and subjective scoring guidelines are some of the factors that tend to discredit cheerleading as sport.

As a result of such criticism, USA Cheer, with help of high school and colleges nation-wide, has created a newer format of competitive cheerleading called STUNT. This competition follows more of a traditional sporting structure. There are quarters, contests are one-on-one (team vs team) and hsvr concrete, objective scoring guidelines.

As a result of these attempts we have good news!

Cheerleading was officially recognized as a sport in December of 2016 by the International Olympic Committee (IOC). What does this mean? You guessed it. Cheerleading can now be considered for the Olympics. But, don’t get excited just yet. It won’t happen overnight. The consideration takes about 3 years for approval of which the IOC can vote to fully recognize the sport.

Once fully recognized, the International Cheer Union could petition to be included in the Olympic games. If that petition was approved by the IOC then at that time cheerleading would be an official Olympic sport! Although we have some ways to go it is looking good. With the recent shifts in structure and the higher appeal towards youth athletes around the world, cheerleaders may soon find themselves standing on the Olympic podium hearing their country’s national anthem ringing and hoisting the gold!