Cheerleader Positional Differences In Balance Performance While Wearing New And Old Cheer Shoes

Abstract

PURPOSE: Throughout a cheerleading season flyers and bases experience position-specific balance demands while stunting that could be affected by the breakdown of footwear as the season continues. Balance performance has not been well investigated between a “new” and “old” cheer shoe when comparing between the position of flyer and base. The purpose of the study was to examine the difference in balance performance of “old” and “new” cheer shoes between flyers and bases. METHODS: Twenty-five healthy male and female collegiate cheerleaders, nine flyers and sixteen bases free of neuromusculoskeletal injuries participated in the study. Shoe age was defined as “new” if brand new from the box, and “old” if worn for more than 64 hours of training. Balance conditions were randomized for each participant and included three stances: bilateral stance, unilateral stance on the dominant limb, and unilateral stance on nondominant limb. All stances were performed on the force plate and foam pad. The average sway velocity (VEL) of the center of pressure was used to quantify balance in the anterior-posterior (AP) and medial-lateral (ML) directions. Separate two-way ANOVAs were used to explore main effects for shoe and position, and interactions between shoe and position for each condition. RESULTS: No main effects for shoe or interactions of shoe and position were observed, P>.05. The ML_VEL and AP_VEL of the bases were significantly lower for the bilateral stance, dominant limb, and non-dominant limb stance on the firm force plate (P<.001), and bilateral stance and dominant limb stance on the foam pad (P<.001). No difference between position was observed for nondominant stance on foam pad (ML_VEL: p=.721; AP_VEL: p=.757). CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that balance performance was not affected by the wear of the cheer shoe but was different between stunt position. Bases exhibited greater balance performance compared to flyers in both a bilateral stance and unilateral stance. It may be beneficial for future research to explore additional measures of balance when performing more dynamic tasks to target the demands of each position.