Welsh Masters 2011 was the first Welsh event Masters have held for several years so we were all very excited to be back. This year, the event was in Barry Island – made famous by BBC comedy serious ‘Gavin & Stacey’, so we were star spotting too!
Arriving at the venue, Barry Island Sports & Social Club, we set up for doors to open at 10.00am; most of Sam’s time was spent messing around with (sorry – technically adjusting!) the lights to set the stage and banners with just the right atmosphere. The trophies looked awesome.
Event staff for the day were Judges Sydney Smyth, Paul Culshaw & Competition Director Nicola Lafferty with apprentice judge Abbie Ingram, scorer & photographer Sam Robins & DJ Jamie Whalley. A special thanks also goes to Charlotte O’Connor for manning the door all day. We kicked off with a Zumba workout from Sydney Smyth – competitors, parents and spectators alike joined in and soon everyone’s pulses were racing as they danced through 3 high energy routines. Zumba is a great way to warm up our competitors ready for the day’s competition, and also a fun easy form of dance that non-dancers can join in and have fun with.
Following the Zumba and competition warm-up music it was time for our dancers to take to the floor. From Rugrats & Primary to Advanced & Allstars, we had dancers from every division – some competing with Masters for the very 1st time. Dance 1 was followed by a WCS Flashmob workshop with Sam & Nicola.
If you haven’t seen the WCS Flashmob look out for the video coming soon to our Facebook page. We performed it at UK Masters in December in Blackpool and are planning to perform it in Liverpool City Centre at European Dance Masters in March – make sure you’re there.
Back to the competition, Dance B came and went without a hitch, and with lots of smiles. Following Dance B was a Latin/Street dance workshop with Paul Culshaw. This was a complex & fast routine but as always, our dancers never faulted and relished to opportunity to get their teeth into some great choreography from Paul.
Dance C was a hi-light of the competition, as our younger dancers got to show off their high energy funky routines and we got entertained by our older dancers performing their showdances. Nicola then taught a Newcomer level Nightclub line dance to the beautiful Country version of ‘Home’ by Blake Shelton and we had a recap of all the workshops that had been taught during the day.
It was then time for awards, with competitors receiving trophies and certificates and in the case of our Primary dancers, teddy bears too!
We closed for a few hours to allow the team to eat – KFC (yum yum) and opened again at 7.30pm for our evening social. As ever we had a wide range of dancers at our social, competitors, intermediate dancers, advanced dancers, parents and friends so there was a very wide range of dances. From the latest top 10 to golden oldies from the early 90’s and everything in between. If you haven’t been to a Masters evening social event you should, we try as much as we can to play all requests and to cater for as many different people as we can.
The social finished up at 11.00pm with everyone tired but happy! It was then time for the team to pack up and head to bed. We’d like to thank everyone who came to support the Welsh Masters, and hope to see you at one of our upcoming events: Southern Masters & French Masters in February and European Masters & Southern Swedish Cup in March.
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