Gymnastics has standards for padding on the floor and apparatus. Why not have something similar for cheerleading especially if we are throwing kids 20 and 30 feet into the air over hard flooring? Even if we are dropping them from standing on the shoulders of teammates, why not have padding underneath their landing area?

Like you, I am not sure what can be done, but I am sure that launching kids up into the air without padding or some type of protection when they come back to the ground would never be tolerated in other sports.

Secondly, the point I was trying to make with the girl’s knees is that it is a false comparrison to say “more people get hurt in cheerleading than in football.” More girls get hurt in basketball than boys get hurt in basketball. I have a feeling that people make the comparrison between football and cheerleading to feed into the idea that cheerleading is a sport (it isn’t) and that cheerleaders are in more danger because of the activity, rather than acknowledging that in comparable sports, women get hurt more than men.

It is simply a false comparrison.

Our “cheerleading” coach taught English and appeared to have been selected on the basis she was willing to do it because she needed the stipend. As far as I could tell, she had no training whatsoever.

Some of what you note is probably because for the most part cheerleading is not considered a sport and as such was not under the athletic department of the school. Thus probably the formation of the two groups the got used that brought about the whole thread.

Although as it has been pointed out it has become more akin to gymnastics than a spirit squad. Other than outlawing certain moves I am not sure what else there is to regulate; shoes, socks and uniforms.(Sorry but those pom-poms are an inch to long?) Athletes have no standard of conditioning necessary to participate, other than a cursory medical clearance.

Orthopedics is not my specialty, but I have been told by those who it is that the prevalence of knee problems with girls is God’s fault. It seems the female pelvic girdle is usually wider than a males and this causes different angles of gait, etc., which can lead to knee problems. But as we recently found out they may have trouble suing the maker, at least in Kansas.

There are two major players in sport regulations at the High School and College Level. The first is the NCAA, which first addressed cheerleading safety in 2005, and basically has prohibited certain stunts from being performed. This is in association with the American Association of Cheerleading Coaches and Administrators. When you read the AACCA “rules,” there is no requirement for safety equipment. The “rules” are basically a restriction of certain moves and stunts.

The National Federation of High School Associations has had a rule book for sports since 1935, but the first rule book for cheerleading was published in 1985. It too only dealt with moves and stunts and not safety equipment. Only recently has the NFHSA come out with rules for safety equipment when doing certain stunts.

The point I am trying to make is that while other sports have aggressively addressed safety in the form of safety equipment, cheerleading seems to be lagging behind in that area. In baseball, everything from the bat to the ball to helmets to gloves to hats to jewelry is regulated. The same thing isn’t there in cheerleading. There is no requirement for the most basic of equipment such as a mat.

Secondly, there is something else that should be looked at and that is the difference physically between men and women. I have never figured this out, but as a sports official, I can tell you that when I umpire a softball game, it is not unusual to see 3 or 4 girls per team with metal knee braces on. In umpiring baseball, it is rare to see a single player on either team wearing the same type of brace. The same is true with basketball. In the women’s game, knee braces are common. In the men’s game, they are common, but very much less common than with women.

I am not saying that any regulation would have saved the girl’s life in this case. What I am saying is that the regulation for safety equipment in other sports appears to be lacking in cheerleading.

I am reminded of the time not that long ago when our governor, who rode motorcycles, got the helmet law rescinded. A couple of years later there was a hew and cry when motorcycle related deaths went up by half again. No matter that we were in a resurgence of motorcycles (no doubt the result of the Discovery channel) and ridership was up over double from the previous years. So now they have to wear helmets again.

So maybe there are more kids participating, maybe the size of the groups have gotten larger and there is less supervision, maybe the kids need better physical conditioning. Maybe there is a back story to the case that resulted in this lawsuit. But until someone can put together the broader picture all I can respond with is based on my own experience.

How recent is your injury data? Is it recent enough to reflect the apparent fact that the difficulty of the stunts that cheerleaders perform has increased in recent years?

Encapsulate your data with meaning, how many children over how many years to spend $4.38 billion on treatment? How many children are participating today in cheerleading versus ten years ago? Does not every school, camp and gym have trained adults to supervise the training of these cheerleaders? Are these adults so devoid of personal responsibility that they robotically only do what the national organization tells them to do? Did these organizations tell this child’s mom not to take her to the hospital even though it appeared she was ailing?

When I went to wrestling camp, we beat the crap out of each other for 9 days. Nobody (including me) got seriously injured. Indeed, I wrestled the a member of the US Olympic team without incident. Why? We had great coaches, great safety equipment, and we knew what we were doing.

Bottom line, cheerleading is dangerous and largely pointless. Without properly trained instructors and good safety equipment, it is a recipe for disaster.