The featured events were the Open Pro divisions in Rhythm and Ballroom and the Amateur Latin Championship.
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Unusually for Florida events, there was very strong showing in the junior and youth divisions. Watch out for a report on these, coming soon in our Happy Feet section.
This ended a very large and successful year for the South Open in what has been a very difficult year for the dancesport industry. Let’s hope for a better year in 2021!!
Full Speed Ahead
South Open Dancesport Championship 2020
It’s full speed ahead here at the JW Marriott in Orlando for the 2020 South Open Dancesport Championship, organized by Sid Pocius.
This might be 2020 and the year our dance world almost ground to a halt, but it’s hard to tell here in Orlando. South Open has witnessed a huge increase in entries this year with pro-ams competing most of the days in a split ballroom. But there seems to be plenty of room in this very large room and the organizer even added extra flooring for today’s events.
https://www.dancebeat.com/m-blogs-en/item/1898-southopen20?tmpl=component&print=1#sigProId215c4f2fb0
As we said, pro-am entries are huge, but the pro heats are also some of the largest we’ve seen this year post March.
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Oleksandr Kalenyuk & Olena Ablitsova were the runaway winners of the Open Amateur Ballroom, losing only 1 first place from 55. Benson Maier & Lucy Maier were 2nd 3,2,2,2,2 and Aliaksandr Rybakou & Grace Brown were 3rd 2,3,3,3,3.
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It was a varied night of entertainment here at South Open that also featured live vocal and dance performances, special pro-am performances by Mary Coombs and a special presentation to her husband Joe for his support of dancing throughout the country.
Stay tuned for tonight’s highlights here on Dance Beat.