What a conclusion to the 2018 Russian Open Championships! The World DanceSport Federation’s fifth Standard GrandSlam of the year is now complete and what a night it was! The crowd went wild for our finalists, three of which were Russian favorites. Dmitry Zharkov and Olga Kulikova took yet another win under their belt with a purely flawless presentation throughout the entire event. Their quickstep solo presentation of the final scored them their strongest score for this GrandSlam, a 39.124 out of 40.000 points possible. They were the only couple in this Standard GrandSlam to achieve a score in the 39.000 percentile!

This year, Dmitry and Olga ended their evening with a final score of 194.708 out of 200.000, standing on the highest step of the pedestal with their well-deserved trophy.

Germany Makes the Final!

Our final also consisted of two more couples from Russia, two from Lithuania, and one couple from Germany that achieved quite the award. Here are the final placements:

Anton Skuratov and Alena Uehlin of Germany made the final this year! Because the bronze medalists of last year, Francesco Galuppo and Debora Pacini of Italy, were not in attendance, there was one more slot open for the taking in the final. It was a strong battle to take that spot between Anton and Alena and Madis Abel and Aleksandra Galkina of Estonia.

In 2017, Anton and Alena were one place behind Madis and Aleksandra: the Estonian couple placed seventh and the German couple eighth. This year, we have Germany in the final in sixth place! Madis and Aleksandra kept their same place as last year – they took seventh, one step away from the final!

Progress in the Semi & Quarter-Finals

Couples that placed in the semi-final also achieved some amazing progress since this event took place last year. Evgeny Nikitin and Anastasia Miliutina of Russia placed eighth here at the 2018 ROC, when last year they placed last in the semi-final, in twelfth place. They gained control over competitors who took the upper hand the year before. Such couples include those from Germany such as Tomas Fainsil and Violetta Posmetnaya who placed ninth this year right after Evgeny and Anastasia, but eleventh last year ahead of the Russian couple.

Another strong achievement highlights Vasily Kirin and Ekaterina Prozorova of Austria, who took the first position in the quarter-finals last year in thirteenth place and were one step away from making the semi-final. This year, they made that semi-final and placed tenth!

Many say that the only element we can control on the floor during a competition is ourselves and ourselves only. We cannot change the floor, the lighting, the music, our partner, nor the adjudicators placing us. We can only have responsibility for ourselves at that moment in time. All the work is behind us, and ahead of us at the same time. The moment comes to perform, not to think, but to completely let go and shine. The grand thing about DanceSport is the passion that we see burning through the eyes of these fantastic athletes! There are truly no words to describe what they put out on that floor and what we have the chance to witness for ourselves as an audience.

With the conclusion of the Russian Open Championships of 2018, our WDSF athletes head back to their training and prepare for what lies next in their agendas.