Sugar Dance cleans up at national competition

Five Sugar Dance Company Street Dance crews brought home silver at the recent South African Dance Teachers’ Association Hip Hop Days competition in Johannesburg.

They were the first set of dance crews to represent KZN in the national dance competition and it was their first time competing as a crew on this level against dancers from all over SA.

The dancers were under a lot of pressure to show everyone that KZN is on par with the rest of SA.

They faced seasoned competitors, most of whom had been training together for months and sometimes years.

The Sugar Dance crews auditioned, learnt choreography, rehearsed and competed all within only three short months.

Despite this, all five crews made it to the finals with the U11 Sugar Snapz, U15 Silverstepperz and the age 16 and over Auto pilots snatching second position.

A few of the dancers entered as individuals in the solo category for their age groups with five out six of the dancers making it to the finals with U11 Caden Calhoun bagging silver and U15 Alex Engelbrecht bringing home bronze. Connor Lumsden placed sixth in the age 12 to 15 group and Angela Balkovic taking fourth in the age 16 and over group.

“They performed against over 900 entries. For their first competition they did extremely well. We did not know what to expect, so it was a bit overwhelming,” said Sugar Dance spokes person El Marie.

The crews needed to score well at this competition in order to earn points on the leader board. to move up to the next category, getting them closer to the World Trial Circuit level where they could be awarded South African colours and the opportunity to represent the country in overseas competitions.

The current aim is for the crew to make it to the international competition, the Battle of the Giants at Sun City.

First they will be competing in the Gateway to Fame competition this month at the Gateway Theatre of Shopping.