As you may have observed in the counter behind the "Videos" and "Photos" buttons above, uploading of both media to this blog is still in progress. The four most recent additions are video recordings of the five quarterfinal dances that were performed on Sunday night as part of the 2015 GrandSlam Standard.
Another new feature that you should be aware of by now is that from the rounds of 48 we identify the tracks that the heats are danced to. In the case of the Quickstep we provide the name of the titles and the artists plus a link to the webshop of WDSF Music Partner in the YouTube comments. But more about that in the coming days!
Casa musica | Tracks and Albums
The Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee (TOCOG) has shortlisted eight sports for continued evaluation with a view to adding them to the programme of the XXXII Games of the Olympiad. The federations governing these sports will now have the opportunity to make presentations at the beginning of August and to submit further information to TOCOG.
DanceSport and 17 other applicant sports didn't make the cut and will no longer be considered for Tokyo 2020. The World DanceSport Federation congratulates the following IFs for staying in the race. We list them in the alphabetical order of their sport.
World Baseball Softball Confederation – WBSC
World Bowling – WB
World Karate Federation - WKF
International Roller Sports Federation – FIRS
International Federation of Sport Climbing – IFSC
World Squash Federation – WSF
International Surfing Association – ISA
International Wushu Federation – IWUF
Together with 25 other sports and for a period of two weeks DanceSport was under the scrutiny of the Tokyo 2020 Additional Event Programme Panel that evaluated whether it should be considered further for inclusion into the programme of the Olympic Games in five year's time. We have reported on WDSF submitting its application by the 8 June deadline and we have described the entire process of selection (here).
Later today an announcement will be made by the Tokyo 2020 Organising Committee as to which sports - or events - have been put on a shortlist for continued evaluation by the panel.
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The final of the 2015 GrandSlam Standard Hong Kong is in progress at the Queen Elizabeth Stadium. One could say that here too there are hardly any major surprises as to the couples that are dancing it. Bjorn Bitsch and Ashli Williamson, DEN, made it after a long dry spell and what they must have considered were way too many seventh places. Their last final dates back to 2014 Tallinn.
Under the "Video" button above you can access more videos of couples dancing earlier in the round of 48.
With a brief look at Yuri's day here in Hong Kong we give our coverage on the 2015 GrandSlam Latin for concluded. With 71 videos you have seen a good part of it. However, the very best is still to come when we release our Vimeo on Demand programme on semi-final and final next Friday, 26 June. Pre-order here!
From this point we turn our attention to the GrandSlam Standard that is about to enter the decisive stages. Uploading of clips on the earlier rounds has already started.
"Born To Win" is tattooed on Gabriele Goffredo's right arm as well as embroidered on the back of his warm-up suit jacket. Actually, it's in Italan: "Nato per Vincere." Gabriele says that it doesn't relate exclusively to sports and that he perceives the motto in a more philosophical way, applicable to life in general.
After last night's win of the GrandSlam Latin Hong Kong, the second of his career as well as for the year, it's hard to argue that Gabriele did not pick a winner when it comes to the choice of life motto. Here are Gabriele and Anna dancing the Samba in the quarterfinal. To the tunes of Nat King Cole's "Não tenho lágrimas" ...
Twelve hours after last night's final of the 2015 GrandSlam Latin Hong Kong we try to put everything into perspective. It all started in the early afternoon with 85 couples having entered the third leg of the Series and all but the star couples with round-one exemptions taking to the floor. And it ended just before midnight - when Gabriele Goffredo and Anna Matus, MDA, claimed their second successive GrandSlam title of the year.
In between there were progressive rounds of great dancing, with Asian couples demonstrating that they are on the verge of breaking the hegemony of the Europeans. It is only a matter of time until we will see them dancing in the semi-finals of a GrandSlam.
In Hong Kong, this stage of the competition was again reserved to the couples taking up the highest positions in the WDSF World Ranking. New faces making it that far and other, similar, surprises are definitely not a regular occurance in the GrandSlam Series that has the ranking's top 20 travelling the world to accrue ever more points to consolidate their positions.
It didn't come as a surprise that the composition of the final was identical to the one we had seen two months earlier in Wuhan, CHN. But that Yury Simachev and Anastasia Klokotova, RUS, ended up in third, their highest GrandSlam placing ever, couldn't be described better than was done by Trần Hiếu Minh, one of our followers on Facebook: "surprising !!! can't believe Yury+Anatasia knock down #4,5,6. Seems like they're doing very well at Asian grandslams ;-D;"
Trần Hiếu Minh goes on to comment on some of the other finalists: "Armen+Svetlana are having their revenge against Balan & Moshenska, but too sad they can't keep #1 at European championship ..." That much for a post-GrandSlam analysis!
There is an immense backlog of videos still to go up over the next few hours. They cover the rounds of 48 and 24! The Vimeo on Demand programme on semi-final and final will get released on Friday 26 June. Pre-order here!