Most coaches design routines that look impressive in the gym. The best coaches design routines that score on the sheet. There's a big difference — and it comes down to understanding exactly what judges are rewarding at each level.
I've built routines for teams chasing their first regional banner and for programs going to Worlds. The single biggest mistake I see, at every level, is the same: coaches fall in love with moments that feel exciting instead of building a routine around what actually earns points. A flashy tumbling entrance gets the gym hyped. It doesn't move the score.
Start with the score sheet, not the music
Before I choreograph a single eight-count, I read the score sheet for that division line by line. Every category — tumbling, stunts, pyramid, jumps, dance — has a point ceiling and a difficulty range. Your routine is a budget. The question isn't "what looks cool," it's "where can this specific team earn the most points it can hit cleanly?"
Write down your team's realistic max in each category. Not the skill they land once out of ten. The skill they land nine out of ten under pressure. That honest inventory is the foundation of everything.
Difficulty you can't execute is worth nothing
Judges reward difficulty and execution. A level-appropriate skill hit clean beats a harder skill that wobbles, bobbles, or falls. I'd rather see a team perform a full-up at 95% than a double-up at 60%. The math almost always favors the cleaner skill.
Build for the deduction, not just the bonus
New coaches chase bonus points. Experienced coaches protect against deductions. A bobbled landing, a late motion, a stunt that takes an extra beat to hit — those quietly drain a sheet faster than any single skill can fill it. When I design transitions, I'm constantly asking: where could this go wrong, and how do I give the athletes margin?
Practical ways to design out deductions
- Give skills a clear preparation beat. Rushed entries are the number-one cause of execution drops.
- Stagger your hardest elements. Don't stack your three toughest sequences back-to-back where fatigue compounds mistakes.
- End sections on stable shapes so a judge's last impression of each phase is "clean," not "shaky."
Showcase strengths, hide weaknesses
Every team has a few athletes who are clearly your strongest and a few who are developing. Good choreography puts the strongest skills front and center — literally, in the center and front of the formation during the moments judges weight most — and positions developing athletes where their contribution is real but lower-risk. This isn't hiding anyone. It's casting the routine so the whole team looks its best.
The first and last 15 seconds carry the score
Judges form an impression fast and they remember how you finish. I load a confident, clean, high-difficulty opening that the team can absolutely nail, and I design an ending that lands sharp and holds. The middle is where you build difficulty; the bookends are where you win the judge's trust.
Clean it like you mean it
A routine isn't done when the choreography is set. It's done when it's clean. Synchronization, motion sharpness, timing, and visual uniformity are worth real points and they're entirely within your control. That's why every JMT choreography package includes a clean-up session — because the difference between a good score and a winning score usually lives in the details you drill in the final weeks.
Build around the sheet, cast to your team's real strengths, design out the deductions, and clean relentlessly. Do that, and you stop hoping the routine wins — you build one that's engineered to.
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