WDC World Professional Ballroom Championship
DANCESPORT: Are there world records in ballroom dancing? Yes, there are!
The General partner - Gazprombank.
Official partner - NordStar Airlines.
And of course we are not talking about goals, points and seconds. Though the scene is dancing, and especially ballroom, which is always surrounded by flavor of sophistication. We are talking about titles and what stands behind them- artistry of the highest range, the highest level of technique, a strong character, charm of personality, and simply charisma.
At the end of the last century a unique couple appeared in ballroom dancing -Marcus and Karen Hilton from Great Britain. They won the world professional title 9 times in a row and with this record they stayed in history of ballroom dancing. And now the current world professional champions Arunas Bizokas and Katusha Demidova (USA) have come close to this record. At the moment they are 8-times world champions, and in Moscow they have a chance to even with legendary Marcus and Karen.
The main event in professional ballroom dancing will take place on 28th of October 2017 in Kremlin Palace. According to a good tradition, the organizer of WDC events in Russia is Honorary Worker of Arts of Russian Federation, RDU President, WDC Honorary Vice-president, Stanislav Popov. Over the last years, because of world and European Latin-American championships held in Moscow, the accent was moved onto this style of dancing. There were not so many highest ranking ballroom events in Russia over that period. The first world ballroom championship took place in Kremlin in 2013, and now, in 2017, it will be only the second one!
Dancing couples from more than 30 countries of the world are expected on the Kremlin floor, including the strongest couples of the planet. They possess an ability to show the whole specter of ballroom dancing colours, elegant and harmonious. Arunas Bizokas and Katusha Demidova (USA) will definitely perform. And also the second couple in the world, also representing USA, world vice-champions, Viktor Fung and Anastasia Muravyeva. This year they won Blackpool Dance Festival, though Arunas and Katusha were not performing due to health issues.
Apart from two American couples, also will be taking part: a great couple representing Great Britain, European champions, Andrea and Sara Ghigiarelli; German champions, Domen Krapez and Natasha Karabey; and Valerio Colantoni and Monica Nigro from Italy. It's own ballroom school has been formed many years ago in Poland, nowadays its "graduates" can be seen in all age categories in WDC competitions. And this time we are waiting for two strongest professional couples, semi-finalists of Blackpool, Sergiu Rusu and Dorota Makar (7 place) and Lukasz and Alessandra Tomczak (10 place). World championship is an open event, and there fore the list of its participants can be very long, sometimes it reaches the number of 70 couples.
Russian team will be impressive. It will be headed by this year's Blackpool finalists, world championship finalists, many times Russian champions, Alexander Zhiratkov and Irina Novozhilova. Successfully compete in WDC competitions our vice-champions, Stanislav Zelianin and Irina Cherepanova (9 place in Blackpool). We are also expecting other Russian championship's finalists: bronze medalists Sergey Sutyrin and Natalia Sazhina, Nikolai Govorov and Evgeniya Tolstaya (world 10 dance champions), Ilya and Alena Asonovi (prize winners of Grand-Prix Russia series). At the official championships usually join Russian team our former many times vice-champions, Alessio Potenziani and Veronika Vlasova (8 place in Blackpool). Getting back into great dancing shape former many times Russian championship finalist, Alexander Ostrovskiy, with his new partner, Maria Kerentseva. Actively compete Dmitry Nakostenko and Alina Oschepkova (world 10 dance championship finalists).
On the same night of world championship also will take place amateur Latin-American Kremlin Cup. It is an invitational competition and normally it brings together more than 20 best couples not only in Russia but also from other countries. This year we have new Russian amateur champions, Vladimir Litvinov and Lyubina Kuznetsova, very beautiful and artistic couple. In Blackpool this year they were in semi-final, and for sure a great dancing future awaits them.
During the whole night in Kremlin Palace will be performing two orchestras. The main ballroom event will be accompanied by jazz-band "Dance land" headed by Honorary artist of Russia, Semen Milshteyn. And the amateur Latin event will be accompanied by "7 winds" orchestra headed by Honorary artist of Russia, Georgiy Musheev. Traditional for Kremlin events will be general dancing sessions to the music of these two orchestras.
The organizers are preparing an interesting program of shows, including Argentine tango, so much appreciated by the audience. 2017 is a year of anniversaries. First of all, we are celebrating 60 years of development of ballroom dancing in our country, first in USSR and then in Russia, and also 30 years anniversary of Russian Dance Union. And of course a jubilee of the championship's organizer - Stanislav Popov! Without doubts, these events will be somehow marked in the program of shows.