Take One for the Team

Chapter 10: The Show

The San Diego Speed Skippers aren't just a competitive jump rope team. We are also a performance jump rope team. That means that we have shows.
We do shows for different events of different causes. Usually it's for a big event like a 5k or carnival. Sometimes we do them for small events to, like a library fundraiser.
Coach Melissa used to organize all of the shows, but since she left, she had asked different parents to sign up to organize a show.
Today was my mom's turn. It was for a cross fit jump-a-thon. Crossfitters like to jump rope and do double unders for a good workout. Their jumping is very different than ours, however. They don't do freestyle jumping or routines. I had no idea what the show would be like.
It took forever to find parking. We ended up parking like a mile away. Then me and my mom had to roll over the speaker, and bring all of Coach Melissa's show stuff with us. We walked the blocks and finally reached the event.
There were carnival booths set up around the basketball court. I found the booth that said Rx jump ropes and walked over.
Rx jump ropes sponsors us, and we were doing this show for them. A man at the booth saw me in my team uniform and walked over.
"You must be a speed skipper," he said, "I'm David."
"I'm Julie," I said. "The rest of the team should be here soon. I'd there a place where we can practice?" He pointed over to a grassy area behind the fence. It looked cool and shady. My mom helped me bring Coach Melissa's supplies over. Soon, Lexi showed up. Then a bunch of other people came, too.
Once everyone was there we sat down and stretched while Lexi wrote the show. I looked around to see who was there. I saw Lexi, Cara, Jake, Ashlyn, Zoey, Leia, McKenzie Becky, McKenzie and Me. Soon it was time to perform.
I looked at the paper where Lexi had written the show. I was in rainbow, where you have a bunch of ropes inside each other, two person one rope with McKenzie, and traveller, when one turner catches a bunch of jumpers and goes down the line.
We lined up on the stage. David had the mike in his hand and said, "Are you ready to see the coolest jump roping you'll ever see?" The crowd cheers. "Then welcome the San Diego Speed Skippers!" The crowd cheered again. We began the show. It went so fast and before I knew it it was the end. We ended with traveller and Cara going down the line catching all of us. I was at the very end. I couldn't screw up, because I would mess it up for all of the team. I jumped really high so I wouldn't miss. But I forgot to look at Cara and stay on beat, and I didn't see her behind me. The rope came over my head and hit my legs. I tried to jump but I fell over to the right. It was a good thing I didn't fall to the left or I would have fallen into Emmie.
I guess that everyone didn't know what to do so they just bowed. The performance ended. Cara helped me up. "You ok Julie?" she asked. I looked down at my body. Except for a few scratches, I seemed unscathed. "Ya, I'm ok," I answered.
After our performance for a while we turned double dutch and let kids and audience members jump in. We would have another performance later.
That's when David came on the mike again and said that the cross fit competition would start in 10 minutes. We walked off the court.
"Hey Speed Skippers!" David said, "Do you guys want to compete in the cross fit competition? It's teams of 5."
"Sure!" we all answered. I wanted to do it, but I saw that Lexi, Cara, Jake, Leia and Ashlyn were already a group and entering. Then I realized that we could enter another team.
"Hey Zoey!" I said. "Do you want to enter in the competition?" I asked. "No thank you," she answered. Zoey is little and shy. I guess it made sense that she didn't want to compete.
I tried to gather up a team, and soon I had rounded up Becky, Emmie and McKenzie. But we needed five people for a team, and we only had four. We went to sign up anyways.
Then David came up to us with a little girl. "Do you guys need another person?" he asked. I nodded. "Bella can compete with you," he said, motioning to the little girl. She was really cute. Maybe 7.
"She can't do double unders, but I'm sure you guys can help her."
And we did. We heard the announcer come on. "In station on, we have West Valley Cross fit!" Cheering. "In station two we have Creak View Cross fit!" More cheering. "In station three we have Rx jumpers! In station four we have Cross fit San Diego! In station five we have San Diego Speed Skippers group 1! And in station 6 we have San Diego Speed Skippers group 2!"
We found our station. How it worked was that the first person would do 50 double unders. Then everyone would do 10 burpies, which are like push-ups. Then the next person would do 40, everyone would do 10 burpies, and so on.
"Oh, boy," said Emmie once they had explained the directions. "I can do double unders, but not burpies." "Me neither," I admitted.
We decided on an order. Becky would go first and do 50. I would do 40. McKenzie would do 30. Emmie would do 20. And Bella would do 10. Since Bella couldn't do double unders, we told her that she could just do normal jumps instead.
It was a really tiring workout. It was a race too. I was sweating by the time we finished.
We came in second, only because it was Lexi's group that came in first. We beat all of them cross fitters!
We took a break to get some water. There was another part to the cross fit competition, but we decided not to do it. We had another performance anyways.
After the competition had ended, we took the floor. We did another performance, only I didn't trip this time. Then David handed Lexi the mike and she started talking about jump rope. Then she handed the mike to Cara and she talked about jump rope. They showed a lot of tricks too. After that we started turning double dutch for everyone, and a chicken mascot jumped in. I had to laugh. I had never seen a chicken jump rope before.
After we finished jumping we all started dancing because there was music playing. Then my mom bought me a thing called a paleo pop at a booth.
Since we had parked really far away, my mom offered to get the car so I could hang out with my friends.
I found everyone doing gymnastics in the grass. Jenny was trying to do an Ariel, which is a cartwheel without hands, and Becky and Ashlyn were doing front walkovers.
Cara was working on her suicide, which is a trick a lot like a flip. They are really hard, but she had done them before, though.
Then Jake decided that he had to learn how to do a suicide. Jake had never even tried one before, but I guess that he decided that now was the time to learn, because he came running from way back on the grass and flipped, landing on his back. We all heard a big thud.
"Jake are you ok?!?? Don't try those you'll hurt yourself!" Cara exclaimed.
"That was awesome!" Jake said. He did another one, this time landing on his head. He proceeded to do five more before my mom pulled up with the car.
On the way home I saw a text on my mom's phone from Coach Melissa.
Thanks for organizing the show today. Hope it was lots of fun! 😄

It was fun!!! We miss you!!!
I replied.