Why I decided to quit sports in college

“Full out until it hits!”

“Pyramid! 5-6-7-8!”

“I wanna see those liberties pulled TIGHTER!”

“Mile repeats… GO!”

“If you can talk to me, you aren’t running hard enough!”

These are only some of the phrases I’ve had embedded into my head from the time I was five years old. I was a cheerleader and a runner up until my junior year of college. To this day, when I walk into a cheerleading gym and hear the words “full out!” I start to sweat for the athletes on those ugly blue mats because I know how tired they are. I know they’ve been in that hot, muggy gym for hours and are exhausted, but hitting the routine perfect has to happen before anyone can leave, even if practice was supposed to be over 30 minutes ago.

circa 2003

I loved cheerleading and tumbling and dancing since I could remember. When I was five I looked at both of my parents, in our little “buckeye room” full of memorabilia at our house and I said to them, “One day, I’m gonna cheer for the Buckeyes!” And last year, I did. But let’s go back to the spring of 2005.

OSU All Girl Cheer at NCA Nationals 2015 in Daytona, FL

For years I had been doing recreational cheerleading for a local football team, the Toronto Titans (OH, not Canada) and I loved it. I loved putting on my uniform every Sunday and doing my back handsprings and cheering for the boys. I loved going to COA Midwest Open every February, but I wanted more. O.N.E Allstars had flyers going around my school for their annual tryout clinic and I snatched one up, threw it in my book bag and eagerly shoved it in my mom’s face as she picked up my nine year old self from school.

Allstar cheerleading was a big commitment, but I wanted to do it more than anything. My mom pulled the typical “Well, I’ll have to talk to daddy about this” and usually I would brush that off as a ‘never gonna happen’ but I was hopeful. To my surprise still to this day, I went to the tryouts a few weeks later and was placed on two of their teams. Within the nine seasons and 10 years with O.N.E Allstars I won countless National Champion titles and made endless friends, some of my best friends.

My coaches knew I wanted to cheer in college and they helped me any way they could. I can’t thank them enough for all of the extra hours they would spend with me in the gym, all the times I would come after running seven miles at track practice and being completely exhausted. I can’t thank them enough for all the times they yelled at me when I needed it and for all of the times they let me throw my cheer shoes out of frustration. Because if it weren’t for them and my parents, I would not have had the chance to cheer for Slippery Rock University or Ohio State on the all girl competition club team.

But it’s been a year since I have put on those white shoes, thrown my hair into a high ponytail with a bow and had a cheer uniform on, and I miss it more than anything. Having to realize school needed to come first and I needed to spend more time focusing on my studies and getting accepted into my major was hard. It was so hard driving to the gym just to tell my coach that because of money and school I could no longer be a “lady Buckeye,” that I broke down and cried in the middle of the gym. Most of my life I had been involved in sports and cheerleading was my thing. I loved it and I was good at it.

Track also took up a huge part of my time, as well as cross country. But track was something I shared with my mother and my late father. Three broken records with my 4x800m relay team in high school was something I was insanely proud of. Did I hate that I spent three of my birthdays in high school running at a track meet? Kind of. I more so hated the fact I had to be up and on a bus by 6:30am but I always knew that this was the first meet for everyone and it was where you start making your name for that season.

giving the freshman a pep talk, 2012

I always say I have only cried after one race, because everyone has THE ONE. Districts finals 2013 for the 4x800m relay. Getting fifth place whenever the top four move on to regionals was heartbreaking. But that was when I knew it was okay that I did not want to run in college. When I decided this, one of my coaches basically shut me out and looked me over. I was never a favorite, but I was definitely not appreciated for my hard work. This angered me to no end but I knew that I could not do cheerleading and track in college.

“So now what do I do?”

The question that fills my head still, more than eight months after deciding I had to focus on school. Yes, I have more free time but I miss having a constant practice schedule to follow and competitions to go to. Track was also a huge part of my life all through school, but I knew my body physically could not do both, at least at the college level. I still run recreationally and am currently training for the CapCity Half Marathon on April 30th here in Columbus. But it’s not the same. Giving up something you’ve done your entire life that has truly made you into the person you are is insanely difficult. And whoever said you would have more “free time” is a liar. You really just have more time to actually do all of the reading you usually skimmed and more time to have breakdowns about “the real world.”

In the past eight months, I’ve learned that my past sports life will always be a part of who I am. Someday, I would love to be a cheer coach and a track coach, follow in my parents footsteps. I spent my toddler days at a track so much that I thought the long jump pit was my sandbox, not something that was part of the sport. From being away from the sports, I know that for me, I will always want to be involved in them in any way that I can. And hey, I got into my major this year and found out I’ll graduate in time so even though I will always miss being on a team, I know it was the right choice for my future, real life adult self to make.

Despite the five broken bones, ankle sprain that will probably never heal, three or four concussions and countless cracks my bones make each day just getting up from a life of sports, I will always miss it.