*This will be pretty long.*

Okay. Tryouts for my high school's junior varsity pom team are in a few months (April?) and let's just say that if they were today, I would not make the team.

It's freshman and sophomore. 12 or so girls. It's serious. I'm currently on the middle school pom team for East (there are two middle schools where I live; East and West). We do kicklines (not too advanced, but not too basic), double pirouettes, c-jumps, "frog" jumps, "star" jumps, toe touches, etc. I can do all three splits.

Biggest things: My toe touches are "form" right (back straight, snapping, arms correct), but I just cannot get my legs up there, and my double pirouettes are shaky. I'd like to be able to nail a triple and get my toe touches decently high (hip level).

Advice for smiling and being a lot tighter would be greatly appreciated, too.. my coach always tells me I look like "the saddest girl in the world" and I stare at my feet. I'm awful at balancing/ reserving my energy throughout routines, too.

I apologize if I'm asking too much.. I've really grown to love pom and it would be the best thing ever if I made JV with my cousin.. you have no idea =)

Thank you!

Current freshman on JV Poms here!! I love seeing dance team posts on here.

So first things first: toe touches. It sounds like, and of couse I may be wrong, you're trying to bring your legs up straight to the sides. Instead, lift them to the front and sit back. If you go inti a straddle on the floor and lift your legs up and to the front so you are balancing on your tailbone, this is the position you should be in for your toe touch. Doing these lifts will also help strengthen your hip flexors and improve your toe touches.

As far as getting your double clean and maybe your triple, do preps and just balance in passé. Make sure your foot is pointed and connected to your supporting leg. Straighten your back and tighten your core. Finally, make sure your arms are in place and your spot is fixed and consistent. Do about ten preps, then quarter turns, half turns, singles, doubles, and triples.

For smiling, I always tell people to imagine that the audience is a cute boy they are flirting with. Smile (with teeth!! Or with your mouth open), wink, blow a kiss or two. Another thing is to mouth vowels and form a smile around those.

As far as conserving energy, that's really just an endurance thing. Do cardio and just dance in general, making sure you can keep yourself at a high energy level for extended periods of time. Remember, do the routine as full out as possible the whole time, collapse later.

Good luck and I hope I was helpful!!!