any one that's possibly on a colledge sqad right now want to tell me what tryouts r like? what you have to be able to do?
or is it just like high school tryouts?
hmm
ya!
thank u~

Interesting...Are you wanting to try out for the CU express, the golden buffs, or the dance line? I'm actually planing on trying out for the express...

i didn't know there were three teams?
i just know about the gold team.
so the CU buff gold or whatever

^ There are three dance teams and one cheer team at CU.

There's Varsity Cheer and Dance, Buff Gold Dance, and the marching band Danceline.

Varsity dance (CU Express) is probably the hardest to make. You get to dance at home games with the cheerleaders. Everything is paid for, but typically they require 25 hours a week for practices, games, etc. It's a LOT to commit to as a college student, particularly if you're going to be doing a challenging major or having a job on the side. I think they compete nationally once a year. I considered trying out for either this team or the cheer team but the atmosphere didn't seem very good to me... Really strict and image-based it seemed.

The Buff Gold dance team is a club sport. This team is pretty good, I think. They've recently gotten even more strict about their own try outs- this year they had a couple days of try outs, followed by a couple weeks of training, after which they made MORE cuts. This is mostly a competition squad. They dance at a couple of basketball games and do some other stuff, but mainly they compete. They seem to do a couple of different national competitions a year. They train less than varsity, but the main drawback is that since it is a club sport, you have to pay. They travel a lot so expenses can really add up.

Finally, there's the marching band danceline. They hold try outs in April, usually. I tried out last year... probably only 50 people showed up and about 14 made it. I was not one of them. On this team, like varsity, I think most expenses are paid for and they travel a bit. I don't think they really compete or do much besides perform at halftime. To be honest, my experience with this team through try outs was not very positive and I'm almost glad I didn't make the team. It seemed like the team was a bit snotty, even though they really didn't DO much.

cubuffs.com has info about the dance team under "spirit", probably soon they will have their try out info up. You can search for "club sports" on CU's main webpage, and there should be a list of club sports. Click "dance" to get the Buff Gold team. Search for "marching band", and once you get to that page, click "danceline" for danceline.

I just realized I forgot to let you know what try outs were like.

My only personal experience was with Danceline.

For this there is no preregistration or fee- just show up the morning of, fill out a form or two and they take your picture, give you a number, etc.

The judges were I think all former danceline members. The coach had some say in who made the team, I think. The team is much more jazz style than anything, they definitely didn't use any poms/cheer movements at all in the try out.

When I tried out in April we started off with pretty simple across the floors- chaines, piques, etc. We did this in pairs in order of our numbers. The across the floor portion of the try out was pretty substantial, there were a lot of combinations involving leaps, turns, etc. They wanted to see solid jazz technique for this team- pretty much everyone who made the team could get the jazz combos really quickly, had clean axles, switch leaps, etc.

After this we did a bit of center work, I think still in pairs. I don't even remember most of this anymore but it was definitely very jazz oriented.

I think there were still more combinations across the floor after this, which got progressively more complicated. To me it seemed that the returning members had a huge advantage, as they apparently all knew the combinations VERY well. It looked like nearly everyone else was struggling to get the combos down, even the people who did manage to pick it up weren't very clean.

There was a short break after this to eat a snack and rest. A few people left the try out during this time.

Once the try out resumed, we started to learn the dance. The dance was a little weird to me. Admitedly, I'm NOT very good at jazz. I'm much better at pom style routines. I thought the choreography was kind of choppy and subtle, I personally thought it was really difficult to memorize right away. They gave us another break a while into learning the dance to practice on our own and work with other people in the group. We finished learning the dance, and I think there was another short break. Then we performed the dance in pairs for the judges. The dance was to some song by Lindsay Lohan, something about "respecting her privacy". The whole song was (in my opinion) kind of angry sounding and I kind of thought it was weird to dance to given that you're supposed to smile like crazy and be happy for the performance.

Judges watched the technique portion of the try out, left while we were learning the dance, and then came back for us to perform the dance.

The try out itself really wasn't too bad, but again, they really stress jazz technique. I can pick up poms and ballet coreography really quickly, but jazz is all together a different story.

I get the feeling other teams at CU are also pretty jazzy. Danceline is probably the least popular dance team, and even they demand clean technique. I think the Gold Buff team is probably just as jazzy, both want to see you do as many turns in a pirouette as you can possibly give them.

I believe Express is more a pom team in the traditional sense. I think they're probably more poms oriented, but I remember their try out requirements plainly listed fouttes, pirouettes, switch leaps, and other jazz things.

DarkIvy pretty much covered everything. However when doing my own research, I noticed that the CU Buff Gold team is a club team- meaning you have to pay fees. I'd also imagine that they're not quite as picky on who they pick for the team, yeah they are pretty much a strictly competition team, but just by looking at their web site they don't look overly choosy. I mean they'll let people try out pretty mcuh at any point in the year if they're interested. I'm sure their a good club but I wouldn't want to have to pay...

^ I did mention that the Buff Gold is a club team involving a lot of fees.

However, I would beg to differ in that they're not "overly" choosey. Two seasons ago I attended the try out info meeting- probably forty people showed up, and I think they only ended up accepting 10 or so. I don't know how many actually went to the try out. I don't think you are allowed to try out at any point during the year, since they have set routines. Generally, most club sports hold try outs in both spring and fall semesters, but I'm not sure if the dance team holds additional try outs in the spring. Some of the club sports at CU are flexible about when an how you join, but I get the impression the dance team is not nearly so flexible.

This year they made try outs even more difficult- two initial days of try outs, the remaining people attended practices for a couple of weeks, then MORE cuts were made. I think they're getting to be pretty good, despite their small size. My guess is that they are about as choosey as danceline, though I can't really say for certain. I think they are (in all likelyhood) a much better team than danceline, as Buff Gold is a nationally competitive squad. They are expensive. I think fees range from several hundred dollars to around $1000+ every season. It IS expensive. They do some fundraising but it at the try out meeting I attended it didn't seem to cover much of anything. Mostly it's out of pocket. Which I guess is fine, but if you're already paying tuition, books, room and board, and everything else, it's a lot. Keep in mind that Boulder is NOT the cheapest place to live to begin with. Just for comparison purposes: I can eat a similar meal at a similar restaurant for half the price in the city my parents live in, just an hour north of Boulder. If you bring a car, you'll be paying out of the (insert bodily cavity here) for parking, including any tickets the parking people decide to spring on you.

I'm guessing one of the reasons the team is so small to begin with is that it is so expensive. For a decent extra curricular, it's not too terribly priced, but even so, I don't think the average student is thinking "oh yeah, $1000? No problem!" Even though they ARE a good team and being involved with something like that is enriching, the fact of the matter is that most students really can't be bothered to spend a lot of money on something that also takes their time.

You could probably try out for all the teams. Usually each team has a different try out date, so if you don't make one, you can try out for something else. Express and Danceline usually hold try outs in mid-late April, Buff Gold holds them at the start of fall semester.