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9th Place 10-Dancers
- Author:
- Viktoria Belova (713-256-1476 | Vikabel@aol.com)
- Date Published:
- October 27, 2005
WORLD 10-DANCE CHAMPIONSHIPS
During the weekend of October 21 – 23, 2005, Viktoria Belova and Eddie Stutts, who teach at The Dance Place, participated in the World 10-Dance Championships held in Italy. Following is Ms Belova’s firsthand account of their trip.
A dinner meeting was held on Friday. The 30 couples were all very friendly and it was nice to meet couples from the other countries. Saturday in the afternoon, all the competitors boarded a bus for the 40-minute ride from the hotel to the Olympic Center in Lazio, close to Rome, where the competition was held.
The competition started at 6:00pm with a parade of all competitors walking around the dance floor. On this day, the first round and then the quarterfinal of the Standard was held. The worst part was changing costumes and preparing mentally for a different style of dance so we could then go through the first round and the quarterfinal of the Latin on that same day.
By 1:00am, everyone was tired and ready to head back to the hotel. We were back in the hotel by 2:00am, eating dinner while waiting for the results of the first section of the Championships. After a long wait with no word of the results, everyone went to bed. Saturday was a very long night of waiting and wondering if you had – or had not – made it to the next round of the event. We woke the next morning to find envelopes had been put under our hotel room doors with the results in them.
In the World Championships, each dance is rated as being in the final or not, so it is possible to make it to the final in the Waltz but not in the Tango, make it in the Samba, but not in the Paso Doble, etc. We were very happy to open our result envelopes and discover that we were marked into the semifinal round in every dance!
Saturday morning was spent preparing for another long day, checking costumes, shoes, makeup, nails, hair, etc, then boarding the bus and heading off to the Olympic Center again. As with the day before, the event started with a parade of the competitors.
We were dancing very well, and were very happy to be marked into the final for both Quickstep and Jive. We ended up in 9th place, which is very good because all the couples from Europe have a chance to compete more often in 10-dance events than couples do in the US. Also, the judges are more familiar with the European couples since they see them in the National and European Championships. So we are very happy to be 9th place 10-Dance champions in the world!
By 2:30am, we are back in the hotel. A late dinner – again! – then finish packing so we can catch the 6:00am bus to the airport for our 12-hour flight back to Houston. It was a lot of stress, and there was absolutely no time for sight-seeing other than during the bus rides to the Olympic Center and the airport. But it was an exciting time for us, and we really don’t mind coming home so tired and happy.
Eddie and Viktoria are available for coaching, demonstrations and lectures. Eddie can be reached via 832-215-4934 or Eddie.Stutts@sbcglobal.net. Viktoria can be reached via 713-256-1476 or Vikabel@aol.com