Leeds-Keele 2006

The Leeds-Keele Northern Friendly Competition 2006 was a held on the 4th of February 2006. The Friday before the comp, I had been tremendously busy with a last minute application, and then I went to get a haircut followed by some chinese food shopping at China Town, and then practice. By the time I got home, cooked dinner, packed, prepared food for the comp and showered, it was already 2am.

The coach was leaving at 5am and I had to be out of the house by 4am! I had an hour's sleep, but couldnt sleep much more after that so I got up and watched 35 mins of Mona Lisa Smile. Left my place at 4.10am and arrived at ULU at 4.30am. Was the earliest so started prancing around to keep warm. We left at 5am and I probably caught another hour or so of sleep on the bus.

Arrived safely. Competed in the Advance Waltz and Quickstep, Open Tango and Vienesse Waltz in the Modern/Ballroom section, Advance Cha and Jive, Open Rumba, Samba and Paso Doble in the Latin Section. Durham has 2 very good couples this year. I was told one of them is a ranked EADA (English Amatuer Dancesport Association) amatuer. I did a quick check online and found out he was the top ranked Junior couple in both Ballroom and Latin previously!

Anyway, somehow me and my partner, Jo, managed to squeeze a 5th place for the Waltz and V. Waltz, 4th for Quickstep and 2nd for Open Tango (only cause there were fewer couples). 3rd in Cha, Jive and Rumba, 4th in Open Samba and 2nd in Paso Doble (again cause there were fewer couples competing). During one of the rounds of the Paso, me and Jo hadn't even gone into our starting position when they had already started the music! She spun in and we were like, shit.. hehe.. but we recovered so all was well in the end. Oh, also, we had to dance the Samba semis twice. The first time, the judge mistakenly wrote my number down twice! We also came in 4th in the team Quickstep but we didnt really care cause we dont usually dance team quickstep anyway. During the team knockout we were up against Warwick and I had to run out to dance against their Quickstep couple. We beat them, but later we didnt have anymore dancers to beat... I think it was Lancaster.... Ooohhh.. me and Jo were particularly happy about beating a mysterious lone couple who danced for Manchester in the team event. We initially thought they were from Liverpool, but now I'm not sure sure. They beat us in all the ballroom events, cause they were obviously way better then us, but we beat them in all the latins! Our initial impression of them was that they were really really good. Still, that stupid EADA couple was just too good for us. WAY out of our league...

Anyhow, it was the 'fun dance comps' at the comp yesterday that everyone absolutely enjoyed. First, there was the Reverse Waltz, then Musical Jive Statues, and the Snowball Waltz. The Musical Jive Statues is when you dance the jive with your partner and when the music stops you've got to freeze. I got pretty far in the Musical Jive Statues, having had to change partners half way through... then in the Snowball Waltz, you've got to dance until the music stops then you've got to get off the floor and dance with someone new. When everyone's already on the floor, the judge would pick the best 6 couples for the finals. I didnt know that we were being judged. I was actually just talking to my partner while dancing.. I thoguht it was more of a social thing. Anyway, I was called back for the finals and was totally confused at first, but it was fun.. hehe.. I came in 3rd.

In the Reverse Waltz in which my normal partner had to lead me and I followed, I tied a scarf around my neck and pinned the other end to my Latin Top's sleeve. Anyway, we were recalled into the finals... when going into hold, the judge was looking at us. It was Gary Foster. Notorious Uni Comp Judge. So I gave him a show and put it all in with the smile and the whole works really. 3 quarts of the way through the event I saw him out to of the corner of my eye approach London team's camp. Apparently he had asked them if I was the guy who had danced the "All Male Rumba" at the Manchester comp, and they confirmed it. I forgot that he had been a judge at that comp, but that was 2 years ago!! I had still be dancing with Mark then! We had won that year. According to Kat, he then said "He's bloody good!". I cant help gloating about it.. hehe.. anyway, right after the music stopped he walked over to me and my partner and he said "Your Waltz is nearly as good as your Rumba. I remember you from Manchester. *wink*"... well.. maybe I might have imagined he winked. Still.. haha.. it was great fun. We won the Reverse Waltz so I got 1 cute little trophy.

Left Leeds at 12.30am, arrived home at my doorstep at 4.00am (driver was a maniac). Showered, ate, uploaded videos, and was sound asleep at 6am... ZzzZzzzz...