11/14-15/25 - Claremont Showdown 

Despite the harsh, rainy start to the 2025-2026 competitive season, UCSD’s Dancesport Team successfully completed their first competition this past weekend at the Claremont Colleges annual Intercollegiate Showdown. 

Beginning Friday night strong with the Nightclub events, Toby Anderson and Cadie Sparks placed 5th in Advanced Polka and 5th in Advanced Blues. Toby additionally placed 1st in Advanced Nightclub 2-Step, 3rd in Advanced Hustle, and 4th in Advanced Salsa. Cadie placed 4th in Advanced Lindy Hop.

With the competition doors reopening at 7am on Saturday morning, Michaelangelo Sansano and Julia Svajda placed 6th in Silver Smooth. Alexander Tahan and Cadie Sparks placed in 6th Gold Smooth. Alex also placed 4th in Novice Viennese Waltz and 5th in overall Novice Smooth. In moving onto International Standard Events, Greg Peregrin and Caitlyn Smith placed 3rd in Newcomer Waltz, 3rd in Newcomer Tango, and 6th in Newcomer Quickstep. Nivedita Kasi and Lyssa Lashus placed 3rd in Newcomer Quickstep, 4th in Tango, and 6th in Waltz. Michael and Julia placed 5th in Bronze Standard Waltz and 3rd in Viennese Waltz. Alex and Cadie placed 4th in Silver Standard Tango, Foxtrot, Viennese Waltz, 5th in Silver Standard Quickstep and Waltz, and 5th in Gold Standard Viennese Waltz. They also placed 7th in the rest of the Gold Standard (Waltz, Tango, Foxtrot, Quickstep). Andrea Hassig placed 6th in Novice Standard Tango and 5th in Pre-Champ Standard.

In American Rhythm, Toby and Cadie placed 1st in Silver Swing and Bolero, 1st in Gold Mambo, and 3rd in Silver Mambo. Moving onto the International Latin category, Michaelangelo Sansano and Rhys Mcintyre placed 1st in Newcomer Cha-Cha, Paso, and Jive, 2nd in Samba, and 5th in Rumba. They placed 2nd in Bronze Latin Paso and 3rd in Bronze Latin Jive. Austin Guiney and Sophie Kang placed 7th in Newcomer International Tango. Toby Anderson and Kenzie Kaku placed 5th in Gold Latin Cha-Cha, Rumba, Samba, and Jive, 5th in Novice Latin, and 3rd in Novice Pasodoble.

Throughout the competition, our team took part in many rookie-lead and rookie-follow events spanning across all styles. Alex Tahan and Zeena Bangar placed 4th in Standard Rookie Follow, featuring Waltz, Tango, and Quickstep. Julia received 1st place in Rookie Lead Bronze International Pasodoble and 2nd in Rumba and Samba. Mars Bau and Zerina Liu placed 1st in Cha-Cha Rookie Follow, 1st in Rumba, and 1st in Jive. Greg and Cadie placed 4th in Rookie Lead Waltz and Tango, and Kaya Morales and Cadie Sparks placed 4th in Rookie Lead Quickstep, Cha-Cha, 6th in Rumba, and 3rd in Jive. The team finished the night with strong performances in all categories, concluding the first competition of the season!