A Whirlwind Month for Team Aria

The first half of September was a killer couple of weeks for Aria Ballroom! Two of the biggest competitions of the year for America took place one right after the other, and Aria Ballroom had some great representation at both. So instead of doing a Student Spotlight article this month, we decided to pay some extra attention to our competitive students, who put it all out there on the floor the last two weeks and definitely deserve some love!

You can almost think of it like a tour, similar to golf tours or tennis tours. On Labor Day weekend, there is a competition in LA called the Embassy Dance Championships, which also holds the World Championships for Pro/Am dancing. The competition ends on the Sunday before Labor Day, and the very next morning, Labor Day morning, begins the United States Dance Championships, which competitive dancers refer to as the USDC. This happens on the opposite coast of USA, in Orlando, Florida, and holds the National Championships for Pro/Am and Professional dancers. And, because of the COVID pandemic, it also held the National Championship titles for Amateur dancers!

When Aria Ballroom owners Simeon Stoynov and Kora Stoynova were professionally competing, they did this tour every year, with a competition in Washington, DC, prefixed to Embassy and a competition in Phoenix, AZ, suffixed to USDC. It was a tough four weeks. They would come home from DC for three days, just long enough to do their laundry, then spend a week in LA training before Embassy began. The moment Embassy finished Sunday night, they would take a red eye flight to New York City and train with their coaches there for two days. Then they would hop on another flight to Orlando, compete four days straight, and zoom home that next Sunday. They were only home for four days, again just doing laundry and getting caught up with a bit of studio work, before flying down to Phoenix.

This year, it was the students’ turns to experience that craziness. Minus DC and Phoenix, Aria Ballroom had two Pro/Am students and one Amateur couple do the LA-Orlando stint, plus a number of other students who competed at one or the other. And they had some great results! Here is a breakdown of how our Team Aria members fared.

Pro/Am – Embassy Championships

We are happy to report that we have some Pro/Am World Champions in our studio! We must start by recognizing our World Champions, Suzanne Dills and Gabrielle Smith. Suzanne, dancing with her teacher Atanas Malamov, won the Senior 2 Bronze Smooth World Championships. And Gabrielle, dancing with studio owner Simeon Stoynov, won the A1 Silver Standard World Championships!

In their other events, Gabrielle with Simeon finished 2^nd in the A1 Silver Latin World Championships, while Etsuko Nishiyama dancing with Atanas finished 3^rd in the Gold Smooth Championships. Etsuko also danced in the highly competitive Senior 1 Standard World Championships with Simeon. And we had a preteen student as well. Vicky Lin, dancing in the Under 12 categories, danced with Atanas in the Preteen 2 World Standard and Latin Championships and placed second in the Standard category! Amazing!

 

Pro/Am – USDC

And now on to the United States Dance Championships. Suzanne and Etsuko hopped across to the other side of the country to compete in Orlando with Atanas and Simeon. Meanwhile, Aria Ballroom instructor Lukas Spisak joined them with his two lovely pro/am ladies, Noriko Sekine and Desiree Villavardos.

Let’s start off with Suzanne, who coupled her World Championship win in LA the weekend before with a National Championship title in the Senior 2 Bronze Smooth National Championships! She wasn’t happy with just one national title. After winning the Senior 2 Silver Standard National Championships, she’s bringing home yet another trophy!

With Atanas, Etsuko Nishiyama made the final of the Closed Gold Smooth Scholarship and placed in the top 6. In the Standard category, she danced with Simeon and placed 2^nd in the Gold Standard Scholarship! In that highly competitive category, runner-up is not bad at all.

Noriko Sekine also competed in the Senior 2 Silver Standard Championships with her teacher Lukas, and she finished 3^rd. It is always exciting when two Team Aria couples can share the podium.

Desiree had a really tough competition in the A Open Latin Scholarship and was unfortunately just out of the final. She danced beautifully, though, and the cutthroat nature of the competition should not diminish from her achievements.

 

 

Amateur – Embassy and USDC

At the Embassy Dance Championships, Team Aria only had one amateur couple representing the ballroom, and that was Adam Lee and Rachel Ma competing in the Adult Open Amateur Smooth. This year they threw themselves into the tour, taking a direct flight to Orland and dancing just three days later at the United States Dance Championships. In Orlando, Adam and Rachel finished in the top 12 of this highly competitive event.

While our preteen star, Vicky Lin, didn’t make the jump over to Orlando, her twin sister Nicky Lin and her partner Leo Liu took the long flight to the other corner and competed in the Preteen 2 Latin and Standard Championships. The Latin was a difficult competition, and after 20 months off the competition floor, Leo and Nicky struggled a bit to find their bearings. But then they competed in the Standard event, and kicked butt! Fighting their way through three tough rounds, they made it all the way to the finals and finished 6^th in the nation!

Lastly, Luke Leonard and Sarah Wilcox competed in the junior age category, for teenage dancers between the ages of 12 and 16. The most amazing thing about Luke and Sarah was that they competed in three different styles! They battled hard for placements in Latin, Standard, and Smooth, and even managed to make it to the top 6 in the Junior Smooth Championships.

All in all it was a great two weeks. The September Madness isn’t quite over yet, as Atanas is heading down to Phoenix with his student Barb. The weekend after, a huge gang of Team Aria members – eight amateur couples in total plus our Silver Standard Pro/Am World Champion Gabrielle Smith debuting her cabaret number with amateur partner Adrian Secchia – are joining Kora Stoynova in San Francisco for the Pacific Grand Ball. And the very next weekend after that is our big local competition, the Seattle Star Ball. September is shaping up to be a crazy month, but after the last 18 months under the shadow of the pandemic, we are welcoming this exciting reentry into the competitive dance world.

Thinking about giving competitive dancing a try? Reach out to us and we’re more than happy to sit down with you and discuss your options. It’s a fun world, rich with excitement and opportunity. We’d love to help get you started!