[cheerforblue]

It was very close! Powell was very sharp on their cheer (way sharper than Estill) but Estill's cheer was loaded with difficulty and was exciting. Powell almost stood in the same spot the entire time, incorporated only 2 jumps, and had little tumbling (I think only seven girls). The hardest pass someone through was a round-off back handspring tuck. Estill had major formation changes, tumbling everywhere (including a full - I know that's not everything though), harder stunting, and they did like 6 jumps through the whole thing. No, they weren't as sharp, but they were somewhat sharp, nobody looked sloppy, and they were all synchronized, even most of their running tumbling was synchronized. This is where they go the edge, because I liked Powell's pom routine much better. Estill's was cute, but I thought the beginning was too fast for the music (though I did like the Grease theme). However, Powell did the little Mexican dance and spelled U-S-A with their poms, and this ALWAYS scores big with the judges. Trust me - I know what I'm talkin' about! If a team does not do something like that, it's usually just mediocre - which is what Estill's was. If they had a better pom routine, the score would not have been as close.

I am new at pom routines.. Do most of the squads use there poms more like spelling things out? Maybe Estill can add something like that to there routine. I really like the faster more engery routines than the slow stuff like Powell did, but like I said I am new at this category..... Both teams were good today...