We often associate cheerleading with American football
and girls in high school, however,
across the pond in the UK, cheerleading
is becoming increasingly more popular.
After Team England took first place at the Cheerleading World
Competition in 2017, they have truly
defined themselves as a new contender in the cheer
community.
I'm here in London to see how cheerleading is growing
and what obstacles they face as they continue
to push to perform their best as the sport
still continues to develop here.
My name is Gina Scarengella, and I've
been a cheerleader for over 10 years.
You may also recognize me from my Instagram videos,
where I spend more time on my hands and in the air
than on my feet.
Now I've come to London to see why
girls are making the switch to cheerleading and joining cheer
squads at an increasing rate.
One of the top teams in London is Unity All Stars Team Ruby.
I headed where they train, in a school gym,
to check in on one of their practices
and see what makes them one of the best teams in England.
We made the grade. We do one full out tonight.
We're going to do the full walking onto the floor.
Just make it great and perform it well.
Please welcome onto the floor Unity All Stars Ruby!
So how far are you all coming from?
It takes me about an hour and a half.
And I get the tube and cycle.
Some of the girls, I think, it takes them two hours.
Why do people travel so far to come here?
I think that it's worth the journey to be
able to be on this team and be coached
by the best coaches in this country as well.
So Tori, tell me a little bit about yourself and what you do.
I'm the program director of Unity All Stars.
I actually started Team England.
You get onto this team, you know great things are expected.
I did gymnastics growing up.
And when I went to university, I stopped doing gymnastics
and started doing cheerleading there.
And then I just fell in love with it.
It just looked like so much fun, and it's just
a very loving atmosphere.
Since you transitioned from gymnastics,
why do you like cheerleading more?
I feel like it's more of a team sport.
So gymnastics, it's quite individual.
But in cheerleading, you've got 22 other girls on the floor.
It's a similar sort of scenario where
you're trusting each other.
You're throwing each other around,
having to catch each other and stuff.
And you just build up a level of trust with your friends,
and they become your family as well.
All right.
So this looks like so much fun.
So what are you going to teach me?
We're going to teach you the jump.
So you're going to take my spot right here.
OK.
So the counts are 1, 2, 3, 4, swing 5,
toe touch 6, swish 3, 4, and then--
This is a lot of counts.
We'll give it a go.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and up.
3, 4, 5, 6, and 8.
1, 2, 3.
Good job!
Thank you.
This is great.
Now I need at least a 10 minute nap.
It's really interesting, because they can't just
put all of these skills together all at once.
They have to actually become individually good.
And then once they perfected that,
then they're linking it together
with all of these other stunts,
and then they bring it all together.
It's really impressive.
The girls-- what is their main focus right now?
So we have a competition this weekend.
So we're going into this weekend
hoping for a better run.
Right now, everything that we're focusing on
is building towards that and to benefiting towards that
and bettering ourselves.
I am so excited to see how they do on Sunday,
and I wish you guys the best of luck.
I hope they amaze everyone.
I'm sure they're going to blow it out of the water, so--
Thank you.
Today is competition day, and I am here
to meet Ruby Team Captain Jane.
So let's go.
-Hello. -Hi.
Come in.
How long have you been on the team?
This is my sixth season.
So what has it been like to see the team evolve over time?
It's just been incredible, because not only has it
changed in terms of the people.
But actually, the momentum has continued.
So we've just seemed to have gotten stronger and stronger
each year.
It does put that sort of added extra pressure
onto the next year and what's going to happen.
But it is just really exciting.
How is the competitive season different
from the United States?
And so we start a little bit later.
We tend to hold tryouts around summertime,
and then we sort of start competing in
January, February time.
And then you have tryouts right after that again
-and it restarts? -Yeah.
It tends to be like the week after our last competition
we have tryouts.
Do you usually have a big turn up?
Everybody comes the first day to try out?
It's quite fun as well, because you see loads of new people,
but then you get to see all the old people as well
and wondering who's sort of coming back and who's not.
So I will let you finish getting ready here.
And I wish you the best of luck today,
and I will be in the stands screaming for you.
We're here to watch thousands of girls compete for a title
at the Just Believe Super Regional Competition
here at the Olympic Park.
Let's go check it out.
So what made you want to become a cheerleader?
I saw it on Instagram, and I thought
it would be quite interesting, seeing I
was into gymnastics and stuff.
Were a lot of the teams that you saw on Instagram
from the US,
or were they teams in the UK?
Most of them were from America.
And then obviously, I was searching for ones over here
and found that it was actually quite a lot
bigger than I thought.
Who's having fun today?
Legacy is the premier event producer
for competitive cheerleading and dance
in the United Kingdom.
And so we really promote the growth
of cheerleading and dance in a competitive environment.
Coming to the UK was so magical,
because this was new territory.
Actually, my first trip to the UK
to see cheerleading in person was pretty eye opening,
because I was so accustomed to what
we saw in the United States.
And so we would see these fold out mats
that Velcro together like you used to have in gym class.
And then halfway through the competition,
the spectators would get up and push the mats together.
Now we're seeing full throttle events
on a truly world class scale.
And we have 3,000 athletes coming in the door.
It's been phenomenal to watch.
We get one shot.
Put everything into it.
I don't want you holding anything back.
You do it once, you make it great.
Please welcome Unity All Stars Ruby!
Let's go!
The Unity All Stars Ruby!
With only one chance to perform their routine,
it looks like they might take first place.
But we'll have to see what the judges think.
So a great, big round of applause to all of our athletes
today here at Just Believe.
Ladies and gentlemen, your division champion
for Legacy's 2018 Just Believe,
in the international open five division is
Unity All Stars Ruby!
Congratulations! You guys won. How does it feel?
It feels incredible.
We really needed this today after everything
that rebuilt us to get to here.
So it'll be a really good moving board from here.
We couldn't have asked for a better day today, so yeah.
Well, congratulations, and I wish you the best of luck.
I'm going to give you a hug!
Good job.
Cheerleading has been amazing here in the UK.
The quality has really started to match
that of other countries.
Though their resources are more limited
than in America, these English teams are striving
for perfection any way they can setting up
makeshift gyms in schools and traveling from all over just
to get to practice.
It just goes to show their level of determination
and their love for the sport.
And I cannot wait to see what happens in the future.