blackpool 2004

Blackpool results for Thursday, June 3, 2004...

Professional Exhibition
The Professional Exhibition Competition is on Invitation only. The couples are free to compose their routine according their own flavour and expression skills, lifts and special costumes are allowed.

This year the following couples were invited and the result were as follows:

1st: Ernest and Samantha Iouvilov (Italy)
2nd: Brian Jolly and Kristina (USA)
3rd: Bing Cheng and Karen La Jia Qu (China)
4th: Remco Bastiaansen & Charissa van Dipte (The Netherlands)
5th: Juan Borrali & Alla Profitlova (Canada)
6th: Martin Pisna and Renata Gregorova (Czech Republic)

The Judges
Mr. Rufus Dustin (USA)
Mr. Jason Gilkison (Australia)
Mr. Paul Harris (England)
Miss Takako Suzuki (Japan)
Mr. Lee wakefield (USA)


Amateur Ballroom
FINAL
1st: Domenico Soale - Gioia Cerasoli (Italy)
2nd: Arunas Bizokas - Edita Daniute (Lithuania)
3rd: Sascha Karabey - Natascha Karabey (Germany)
4th: Warren Boyce - Kristi Boyce (England)
5th: Federico Ditoro - Genny Favero (Italy)
6th: Paolo Bosco - Silvia Pitton (Italy)

Semi Final
Marat Gimaev - Alina Basyuk (Russia)
Maxim Kotlov - Elena Uspenskaia (Russia)
Stefano Soldati - Annalisa Longo (Italy)
Domen Krapez - Monica Nigro (Slovenia)
Benedetto Feruggia - Claudia Koehler (Germany)
Andrea Ghigiarelli - Sara Andracchio (Italy)
 
Blackpool results for Friday, June 4, 2004...

Latin Formation
1st: Brigham Young University Latin Formation Team (Trained by Lee & Linda Wakefield)
2nd: Botafogo Dance Ensemble (Trained by Tibor Dalotti)
3rd: South of England Latin Team (Trained by Melanie Walker and Britta Schneidereit)
4th: XS Latin Formation Team (Trained by Bruce Lait)

OVERALL Professional Ballroom
1st: Christopher Hawkins - Hazel Newberry (England)
2nd: Timothy Howson - Joanne Bolton (England)
3rd: Jonathan Wilkins - Katusha Demidova (USA)
4th: Mirco Gozzoli - Alessia Betti (Italy)
5th: Alan Shingler - Donna Shingler
6th: Jonathan Crossley - Lyn Marriner (England)
7th: Giammpiero Giannico - Ieva Pauksena (USA)

Professional Ballroom :arrow: Waltz
FINAL
1st: Christopher Hawkins - Hazel Newberry (England)
2nd: Timothy Howson - Joanne Bolton (England)
3rd: Jonathan Wilkins - Katusha Demidova (USA)
4th: Mirco Gozzoli - Alessia Betti (Italy)
5th: Alan Shingler - Donna Shingler (England)
6th: Jonathan Crossley - Lyn Marriner (England)

Semi Final
Roberto Villa - Morena Colagreco (Italy)
Tony Dokman - Amanda Dokman (Netherlands)
Roberto Giuliato - Serena Picco (Italy)
Giampiero Giannico - Ieva Pauksena (USA)
Michele Bonslgnori - Monica Baldasseroni (Italy)
Victor Fung - Anna Mikhed (USA)
Koji Hiyama - Kumiko Hiyama

Professional Ballroom :arrow: Foxtrot
1st: Timothy Howson - Joanne Bolton (England)
2nd: Christopher Hawkins - Hazel Newberry (England)
3rd: Jonathan Wilkins - Katusha Demidova (USA)
4th: Alan Shingler - Donna Shingler (England)
5th: Mirco Gozzoli - Alessia Betti (Italy)
6th: Jonathan Crossley - Lyn Marriner (England)

Semi Final
Roberto Villa - Morena Colagreco (Italy)
Brian Eriksen - Marianne Eihilt (Denmark)
Alexey Galchun - Tatiana Demina (Russia)
Tony Dokman - Amanda Dokman (Netherlands)
Giampiero Giannico - Ieva Pauksena (USA)
Michele Bonslgnori - Monica Baldasseroni (Italy)
Victor Fung - Anna Mikhed (USA)

Professional Ballroom :arrow: Tango
FINAL
1st: Christopher Hawkins - Hazel Newberry (England)
2nd: Timothy Howson - Joanne Bolton (England)
3rd: Jonathan Wilkins - Katusha Demidova (USA)
4th: Mirco Gozzoli - Alessia Betti (Italy)
5th: Jonathan Crossley - Lyn Marriner (England)
6th: Alan Shingler - Donna Shingler (England)

Semi Final
Roberto Villa - Morena Colagreco (Italy)
Tony Dokman - Amanda Dokman (Netherlands)
Roberto Giuliato - Serena Picco (Italy)
Giampiero Giannico - Ieva Pauksena (USA)
Michele Bonslgnori - Monica Baldasseroni (Italy)
Victor Fung - Anna Mikhed (USA)

Professional Ballroom :arrow: Quickstep
FINAL
1st: Christopher Hawkins - Hazel Newberry (England)
2nd: Timothy Howson - Joanne Bolton (England)
3rd: Jonathan Wilkins - Katusha Demidova (USA)
4th: Mirco Gozzoli - Alessia Betti (Italy)
5th: Giampiero Giannico - Ieva Pauksena (USA)
6th: Jonathan Crossley - Lyn Marriner (England)
7th: Alan Shingler - Donna Shingler (England)

Semi Final
Roberto Villa - Morena Colagreco (Italy)
Brian Eriksen - Marianne Eihilt (Denmark)
Michele Bonslgnori - Monica Baldasseroni (Italy)
Victor Fung - Anna Mikhed (USA)
Koji Hiyama - Kumiko Hiyama (Japan)
 
Wow, looking at the Pro ballroom marks, it was very close in all the dances except Quickstep (where really almost everyone agrees that Chris and Hazel are best).

But in both the Waltz and the Tango, Tim and Jo were within 1 mark of winning... so the results could easily have been reversed!

Robin
 
I only managed to make it to the Blackpool Library on Wednesday, when it was closed, so I wasn't able to report earlier - sorry about the delay!

First impressions: Friday, 28 May

This is the first time I've watched the Senior at Blackpool. I know roughly the quality of the final, having seen various finalists at other competitions, but I'm unfamiliar with what the earlier of the six rounds are like. I'm expecting that the first round will be rather weaker, as is true in the other events at Blackpool that I've watched.

It turns out I am wrong. With few exceptions, the hundreds of dancers cut in the early rounds are not very much weaker than those that make most of the cuts. I count 14 U.S. couples in the program, of which only 3 make the first cut - and the U.S. is considered relatively strong in the Senior category.

Not wanting to stay until 5 am U.S. time, we leave early. We later find that at least one U.S. couple made the semifinal.

Saturday, 29 May

The morning "practice session" is as crowded as always, though there hasn't previously been such a session on Saturday. It is split into three heats of perhaps a hundred couples each. The few who actually try to practice are constantly bashing into others. The remaining 95% get a good warm up.

The first round of a new event - the "Amateur Rising Star". All but the top 12 of the "Amateur" category are allowed in this event, along with all of the Youth (under 21). It appears to me very slightly weaker than the first round of the Amateur last year. My partner thinks it is just as strong.

I was worried about the floorcraft danger in this event, as the youth competitors have a reputation for crashing through with high speed and little control. I'm pleasantly surprised to find the opposite - nearly all the couples seem willing to do their part in avoiding collisions. Perhaps the coaching emphasis has changed. Richard Gleave, the daytime chairman and MC, also seems surprised and relieved - he doesn't have to issue any floorcraft warnings at all, and in fact compliments the competitors on this after they have danced.
 
Monday 31 May:

We watch the Professional Rising Star competition from the first round, as we know Victor Fung and Anna Mikhad will be in it. They don't disappoint - they fly around the floor at high speed whenever no one is in the way, and are the only couple for whom this size of floor seems a limitation. What's more, they make it all look so easy and relaxed, in contrast with most high speed couples, who seem to labor at it. We're very happy to see them win.

Wednesday 2 June:

The qualifying round for the "Amateur" Ballroom. Entries are down to 255 this year from 280+ last year, and they've decided to remove one round. That will make it much more difficult to make the first cut, of course - especially since most of the people who dropped out for this year are probably those who did so from discouragement at not making the cut last year. No doubt many of those who made it last year and miss it this year will drop out next year as well, absent some other change.

By the time the event begins, I've already given up on making the cut. Instead, I decide to dance only for myself, the way I'd like to dance. Good thing, as the early heats look much stronger last year - it looks more like last year's second qualifying round than like the first qualifying round.

Unlike Saturday, the competitors in this event generally aren't interested in doing their part in collision avoidance, dancing with looks that clearly indicate that they are going to charge on through. As a result, I do a lot of collision avoidance myself - though since I'm dancing only for me, I don't mind so much. Our coaches seem impressed that we manage to make it through all four dances without a single collision.

Thursday 3 June:

We watch the rest of the "Amateur". While the first round was stronger than last year, the final seems weaker. It seems like most of the finalists have been in it for years, and really don't seem to have improved much. It seems like the difference in quality between the first round and the final is compressing over the years, and we wonder if that is also the reason for the relatively uniform standard we've observed in the Senior. Interestingly, this is not the case for the professional events.
 
Great to get your "from the scene" perspectives Warren, thanks for sharing!

Question: were you there for the Awards when Victor and Anna won? I'm curious what your perspective was on the situation marykomatsu mentioned...
 
What can you all tell me about this couple from Germany, Bryan Watson and Carmen Vinceli, and the couple from the USA, Slavik Kryklyvyy and Karina Smirnoff? These two couples took first and second (respectively) overall in Latin, and in every event under that category!

They must be *VERY* good to have achieved this, and I don't want to sound like I'm crawling out from under a rock asking who they are, but I'm curious to know! I'd very much like to be expanding my knowledge of competing couples within my first year being in this exciting world of Dance!

Sakura Kitty :kitty:

(PS- It's amazing to me how much I've learned since I first came onto this site, and how much I'm sure I still will learn between now and September (my one year mark), so, thanks to everyone who posts and answers my questions, and just makes this Forum an awesome place all around! :D :D You guys really are awesome!

Also, SD and WJD, thanks a *TON* for keeping those of us who can't be either at Blackpool or keeping up with it informed as to everything that's going on there! :wink: Great work.

...This story with the Fungs is getting very interesting! More perspectives, come forward!)
 
Regarding the Fungs, yes, I was there for the announcement of the awards, though not for the announcement the next day that I can remember.

First, a bit of background. In the professional championships, each dance is announced individually. Because there are a lot of announcements, people don't generally take a very large amount of time accepting applause - even the competitors want to know the result in the next dance. Perhaps because of this example, competitors in the other events, such as the Rising Star that we are talking about, don't generally take that long to accept applause either, even though they only come out once.

So, what I remember is that Victor and Anna did spend a bit more time accepting applause than is typical at Blackpool - though not more time than is typical in the U.S., where I believe they've done most of their competing. I think this was Anna's first Blackpool final. Perhaps a bigger factor was that they were clearly the crowd favorites, so the applause was going on strong for a long time - it might even be considered impolite to turn your back on a crowd that's cheering for you!

I think Brian and Marianne may have been announced before the applause had died down for Victor and Anna, and Brian and Marianne might have felt that robbed their fans of a chance to show their support. They certainly looked unhappy in the lineup, though I attributed that to the fact that they were expecting to win, and hadn't accounted for Victor and Anna appearing virtually out of nowhere as far as they could tell.

To the extent there was a problem, I'd say it was due to an inexperienced MC who failed to properly judge the audience and time his announcements accordingly. That may also be the night when he was running half an hour late because of an earlier mistake that had required the rerunning of a heat in an earlier round, in which case he might already have been performing less than optimally (Blackpool usually runs within 30 seconds of schedule).
 
Hmmm, interesting. I just got of the phone with a friend of mine who was there who had a different take on it. My friend's account was that when Victor and Anna were announced there ended up being over 20 photographers on the floor snapping away and that Peter Maxwell had to ask all but the official photographers* to leave the floor. Normally it is only after all the couples are on the floor, in a line up, that people come out to take photos and, because the 1st place couple was announced first and drew this response, this is what caused the disruption that held up the remaining result announcements.


* For those who do not know, there are only four official photographers who are allowed on the floor/edges (and, just FYI, the German Open is the same way).
 
SD and WJD: Thanks for the coverage you have provided!

I'm not familiar yet with most of the names of these couples, but between these results and the photos posted elswhere, perhaps I can begin becoming acquainted and more aware of who is at some of the bigger comps over here in the U.S. Thank you!
 
In response to the question about the Rising Star awards announcement... My memory is better that Warren's, so I'll give my account of what happened.

There was a great deal of cheering for Victor and Anna, and rightly so. They danced beautifully, and were clearly the favorites of the majority of the crowd, not just the Americans. They did take a few bows, but it certainly didn't seem like very long to me, and the crowd was certainly very loud in their applause. Once they received the cup and the flowers, the official photographers came out to take their picture, and a number of other people rushed up to where the photographers were so that they could also take pictures. This was the proximate cause of Peter Maxwell's initial remarks. He asked that everyone who was not an official photographer leave the floor, stating that it was not fair to the other couples.

Warren and I were not in the ballroom on Tuesday, so we can't comment on anything that might have been said then. There were lectures at the Imperial Hotel for North American competitors that ended up running until 7pm, and we decided to get in a little practice afterwards. That combined with an early morning for me the next day meant that we skipped the Tuesday session entirely.

I can't help but think that there must have been a better way of handling the situation. Combined with they way in which the result was read, I was left with the impression that Mr. Maxwell was not happy that Victor and Anna had won the Rising Star and would have preferred the second place couple. I know its probably unfair to contrast him with Bill Irvine since I only heard Bill announce after many year experience, but I always got the impression from Bill Irvine that he was simply delighted with the every result he read.
 
Ack, I took too long to write my post and SD got to the bit about the photographers before me. Sorry for redundant information. But yes, there were about twenty in addition to the four official photographers, so the account of SD's friend matches my memory of the event.
 
Thanks for the confirmation Elizabeth. Since your recollection matches the account I was given earlier today I'd say that, at the least, this describes the framework for what happened.

Always good to have as much confirmation as possible too! :D
 
I just realized that I hadn't posted anything about the Latin at all. Hm, I'll start with the team match.

There were a lot more people in the audience for the team match than there had been last year - probably because, perhaps for the first time ever, Great Britain was facing a serious challenge. While they did have probably the strongest single ballroom and latin couples in the team match, the U.S. had the same number of finalists - three out of the four couples making up the team - who finished nearly as high last year, and the fourth U.S. couple was a very strong semifinalist, while the fourth British couple was not.

In the event, though, I felt that the U.S. Latin couples did not dance their best, and in fact the Russian Latin couples got a larger cumulative score than the U.S. Latin couples in at least one dance. Meanwhile, all the British couples were definitely dancing their best. So Britain still won, after all.

Okay, on to the pro Latin.

In answer to the question, Brian Watson and Carmen are pretty much the undisputed best Latin couple in the world. They were #2 at the last Worlds that Donnie & Gaynor won a few years back, and went back and forth with a couple of other couples for a few years until those couples retired. To my mind, Brian and Carmen won pretty easily this year, though I thought they were not quite at the peak they were at at the USBC last fall - perhaps the lack of a challenge from Paul Killick had something to do with that.

Slavik and Karina have been coming up the ranks for a few years, I believe. I like Karina's dancing very much, but I have to admit I think Slavik sometimes seems overly aggressive, particularly in his floor placement.
 
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