- Sports , Student
- 26/02/2024
Sports spotlight | Twist’s favorite number is 5
Gymnastics and cheerleading association Twist loves stunts
TU/e boasts a total of 38 student sports associations. And every one of them offers its own unique experience: from slamming aces to skimming across the water. At student sports center SSC, you get a wide range of options to choose from: gaming, jumping, running, cycling, rowing, flying, shooting, hanging, playing chess, surfing and pushing. Cursor wants to put every one of these associations in the spotlight. The first question is “What is your favorite number?”
Warming up
Twist is the association for “rough-and-tumble acrobatic fun”. It’s a turn- and cheerlead association. And when we say “cheerleading”, we don’t mean applauding girls cheering on some team with pompoms (“that’s called sideline cheering”), but rather stunts.
5 is Twist’s favorite number for a host of reasons (five of them, actually). “Women use 4 types of apparatus in gymnastics and men use 6, so 5 is right in the middle,” says the board. Plus: “You can have 5 people for a stunt group: back, main base, side base, flyer and front or spot. Twist members have gymnastics and cheerleading practice on Mondays at Sports Hall De Vijfkamp (which literally means “pentathlon”, Ed.) located at Vijfkamplaan 5. On top of that, 5 is also the number of letters in “Twist” and finally, our board consists of 5 members.”
Scores
Twist has a lot of interesting figures to share. Let’s jump right in:
- Membership stands at 80 (1/3 of whom are men)
- Judith van de Kerkhof is chair of the 39th board
- There is 7.5 hours of practice a week
- Twist requires 144 m2 of space and a length of 15 m
- A competition lasts 3 hours
- A set of parallel bars for men costs € 9631.60
- An outfit costs € 70 (leotard) + € 70 (shoes) + € 60 (leather grips for hands). A competition leotard costs € 86
- The farthest distance traveled for a competition is 250 km (Groningen)
Cursor’s last question is a bit awkward. How many verses does the association song have? It turns out that the gymnastics and cheerleading association doesn’t have one. However, they recently came up with a yell, and quite a good one at that. Here it goes: “Tumble, flip and fly. We’re reaching for the sky. Twist”.
Analysis
144 m2 and 15 m in length:
Officially, a mat of 12 by 12 meters is required for the floor exercise. That doesn’t fit in the SSC, so on Mondays, Twist practices at Vijfkamplaan in Woensel. Twist has a 15-meter mat on which she practices series, and it does fit in SSC. However, it’s an airtrack that has to be inflated and deflated every time.
3 hours per competition:
Five times a year Twist participates in a competition weekend. One day would be enough for three three-hour competitions, but they add dinner, party, sleep and breakfast just for fun.
And a final fun fact we can’t leave out is the reason why SUCA (which is what the association was called until four years ago) changed its name to Twist. “SUCA is a swear word in Russian; and given the increasing internationalization, that’s not very appropriate,” says the chair. But she does understand why the club was once given that name: "SUCA stands for Super Caprum, which is Latin for 'over the buck.'"
Discussion