On Wednesday 8th February an Inter-Schools Pom Dance Competition took place at Canon Slade School in Bolton. Six different local schools attended and a fantastic afternoon was had by all involved.

The competition was split into two sections: Key Stage 3 and Key Stage 4. UKCA Judge Danielle Oddie had the honour of being invited and went to judge the competition along with 4 other judges who all coach local UKCA Cheerleading Squads.

The talent shown over the whole afternoon was very impressive and the spirit of all the cheerleaders throughout the whole competition was phenomenal. All 5 judges agreed in the end that the UKCA Spirit Award for the Bolton Schools Competition should go to Canon Slade, who showed fantastic Cheerleading spirit and gave support to all of the other teams.

UKCA look forward to next year’s competition and hopefully we will see some of the teams again at the UKCA National Schools’ Championships in June.

Congratulations to Team UK, who recently finished …. in Hong Kong at the ICF World Championships – one of the best results we have had in this competition. Team UK received sponsorship from UKCA, Milano and Curlformers to enable them to compete.

Please click here for the full Championship Results

Year two of the UKCA and Let Me Play Summer residential camp was another fantastic success and it was great to see familiar faces and welcome new members to the Cheerleading family during the first week of August 2011.

The setting for the camp is just incredible. Elmhurst Royal School of Ballet in Birmingham is a pleasure to work in, with over 10 fully equipped studios to choose from and a state of the art theatre to showcase a final performance in. The camp location is definitely one of the highlights of the week.

This year was truly international we had participants from all over the world, including Qatar, Switzerland, Germany and Spain, plus of course a range of young people from all over the UK too. It certainly proved that Cheerleading crosses language barriers as the whole group gelled and became great friends whilst achieving and working hard to pull off a great final show.

Part of the fun is staying on camp, there is a mixture of sleeping arrangements, some shared dorms and other individual rooms with en suite facilities, lights out is always interesting to see how creative the campers can be with rule bending and sneaking around sleeping areas! Makes breakfast story swapping very funny the next morning.

Talking of breakfast, this is just one of highlights on the menu, all the food is lovely, plus with all the hard work and sweating that goes on during the day, the lunches and evening meals are always something we look forward to.

At night there is always something going on, organised activities, chilling in the common room, showing off talents and skills, and practising the days routines is usually what surrounds you. Throughout the week you meet so many passionate, talented and motivated young people it really energises you, there’s a constant buzz around camp generated by all the enthusiasm.

We were so happy to be a part of the camp again this year and it was positive to see how its grown and developed from last year, we are very much looking forward to being involved again next year. So what are you waiting for? Get yourself booked onto the Let Me Play Cheer Camp 2012.

There are many talented athletes that have the passion, dedication and the ability to make UK proud, are you one of them?

This year we are looking to form a national Team UK, bringing athletes from across the country to work together to build an All-Girl level 5 routine for the World Championships. Auditions will take place in the September 4th, 2011 from 1pm – 5pm at Leigh Gymnastics. If you cannot attend the live auditions you have the option of submitting your audition via video. Video submissions need to be received on or before September 1st, 2011.

For more details please visit www.teamukcheer.org

The National Community Championships took place at Manchester Velodrome last weekend, showcasing the vast development of cheerleading within the UK.

This year we saw 179 performances, with over 1600 cheerleaders competing, it was also the first time the UKCA has run a competition with a double judging panel. We saw some very impressive performances in all 3 of the categories, Cheerleading, Group Stunt and Pom Dance, from our Tiny Teenies divisions, where some competitiors were as young as 3 years old, all the way up to our Masters, some of who were over the age of 60!

The atmosphere in the arena was electric with the 1000’s of cheerleaders, coaches and spectators all being entertained by not only the amazing performances that were on the floor but also the wonderful MC’s who kept the energy up throughout the day, even after 10 hours of work!

Many thanks to everyone who came whether it was as a competitor, volunteer, spectator or coach, without you we would not have been able to run such a fantatsic event! WE ARE PROUD OF YOU, SAY WE ARE PROUD OF YOU!