The Grand Nationals Championships started Thursday the 29th of October with a nightclub session and ended Halloween night Saturday, October 31st. Grand Nationals had a whopping seven and a half thousand entries for the weekend and it concluded with upscale professional championships featuring some US Finalists in all divisions and running a full semifinal round in both the Professional Smooth and Latin.
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Although we had some wonderful pro-am events with full semifinals and even some quarter finals, the highlight was Saturday night with the Professional Smooth and Latin. Th pro events followed a 5-course banquet dinner in the ballroom that was literally sold out due to social distancing requirements.
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The Amateur divisions in the Latin were very strong. The Open Latin was won by Vadym Pidhoretskyy & Abigail Srulevich who comfortably won all dances. Runners-up were Benson Maier & Elisabeth Thompson 3,3,2,2,2 and the Youth Champions, Nickolas Bleykhman & Alissa Joly were 3rd, 2,2,3,3,3. Markus Ilo & Agata Tulchinskaya won the Youth Ballroom.
Selected highlights from the pro-am divisions included the always popular “Grand National Challenges” that are open to all levels and age groups. The winners of these divisions this year were: Nichelle Kennedy w/ Aleks Nashev (Rhythm); Natasha Janey w/ Iaroslav Bieliel (Ballroom); Linda Gill w/ Roman Malkhasyan (Smooth); Lena Panin w/ Artur Tarnavsky (Latin).
In the Open Scholarships there were also some excellent events. Winners in these divisions were: Nichelle Kennedy w/ Aleks Nashev (C Rhythm); Natalia Zavodchikov w/ Dmitry Demidov (A & B Rhythm); Letizia DeCarlo w/ Mario Drobny (B Ballroom); Natasha Janey w/ Iaroslav Bieliel (C Ballroom); Linda Gill w/ Roman Malkhasyan (C Smooth); Natalia Zavodchikov w/ Dmitry Demidov (A Smooth); Kelly Prisco w/ Paolo DiLorenzo (B Smooth). We must say that the Open Latin Scholarships were really outstanding – especially in the A Division. The winners were: Letizia DiCarlo w/ Mario Drobney (B Latin); Angelina Evseeva w/ Dmitriy Pugachev (A Latin); Andrea Bennington w/ Ivan Mulyavka (C Latin).