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NZ Going for Gold at Dance Olympics
NZ Going for Gold at Dance Olympics
All eyes may be on our athletes in Rio, but another group of talented Kiwis are in with a chance to bring medals home from what is considered to be the Olympics of the hip hop dance world.
Six crews from New Zealand are competing in the four divisions of the Hip Hop International World Dance Championship finals in Las Vegas later today (from 1.30pm NZ time). The event will be live streamed online from Hip Hop International.
More than 3000 dancers from 50 countries have attended the annual event, and the finalists will perform in front of a 10,000 strong crowd. In the junior division, 41 crews have been whittled down to just six, with two New Zealand crews – Bubblegum from the Palace Dance Studio and Kaleidoskope from Notorious Studio – going into the finals in sixth and second position respectively.
Seventy-one crews started in the varsity division and now just eight have progressed to the finals, with Masque from Identity Dance Company (IDCO) currently in third position.
The adult division started out with 74 crews, including the Bradas from IDCO, who are the current world champions after winning gold last year. They are tipped to take out the title again this year following their performance in the semi-finals, which left them in first place out of the nine crews who’ve gone through to the finals by a comfortable margin.
And in the megacrew division, of the 57 crews that started, the Royal Family Varsity from the Palace Dance Studio and IDCO are in fifth and second place respectively.
The competition has been a particularly successful one so far for Sandringham-based Identity Dance Company (IDCO). All three of the crews they sent to the world champs have ended up in the top three positions in their divisions going into the finals.
New Zealand is also providing the non-competition entertainment at the championships, with internationally-renowned Kiwi choreographer to the stars Parris Goebel performing her new show The Parris Project and releasing her first album as a rap artist at the event.
Watch live today here https://www.twitch.tv/officialhhi
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