The sweat drips down their faces. The heat seems to be unbearable, and the mask covering their airways doesn’t make the situation any better.

While other sports are exempt from the mask mandate, cheerleading and drill team are required to wear masks at all times and social distance more than six feet. 

These athletes feel that it is unfair to be specifically called out and punished for their masks falling down while working out. 

As a result the cheer team has the lowest number of positive cases. It is wrong for just a certain group to get in trouble for having little to nothing wrong with their organization while other sports, groups and organizations have higher numbers and are not having COVID-19 rules enforced. While working out, you need to breathe for advanced performance, but if you are wearing a mask, it is difficult to breathe. It is also scientifically proven to make your lungs smaller when your air flow is restricted.

It is understandable that these organizations are forced to wear masks while working out because they can be close together and breathing all over one another. But in fact, these ladies are all scared of getting quarantined around competition season. While other sports have games during only one season, cheerleading and drill team have two or three competitions each year.  Cheerleading and drill team are not just “Go team” and twirls, they still practice, have team workouts and attend events as any ordinary ‘sports team’ would. 

The school can solve this issue at its root cause, high school sports teams. Therefore, the best solution would be to require masks for all sports teams. This will ensure to keep each team and its athletes safe and lower the risk of getting quarantined. If each team wears masks properly, the schools will deal with fewer people out of school due to a positive test or a contact tracing incident.