Congratulations to Mina QUEEN SALSA - “Trainer of Champions!”
Mina has been teaching Salsa in the UK (mainly London) since 1991, as many students and Salsa teachers – taught by Mina at some point over the years – can affirm.
In early 2005, she was asked by some of her students if she could train them to win…not just enter, but WIN a Salsa competition. In her inimitable way she said “of course I can…as long as you’re willing to learn, work hard, be committed and consistent, then you can do it!”
So, drawing on her extensive Salsa teaching experience, she set about creating some routines and choreographies to suit her students’ capabilities, training them to a very good competition standard – and beyond – to a point where she now has two couples with three competition wins and one runners-up place between them, and all that within just over a year and a half.
This winning streak started around Easter 2005 when Mina teamed Anwar Azari up with Catherine Salter (students who began learning Salsa with her from scratch) and started training them for a competition (any competition) that would be taking place around the time that she felt they would be ready.
As luck would have it, by the time they were ready in December 2005, Leon Williams of Salsa South Connection was organising and presenting his First ‘Salsa Champs’ South East England Open Salsa Dance Championships in Maidstone, Kent.
Anwar and Catherine were entered into the Amateur category of the Championships and, even though they had some reservations about their abilities, they dazzled the judges and the crowd with a well coordinated and artistic routine, full of fast and furious fancy footwork, spectacular high kicks, lifts and splits, and an amazing array of scintillatingly sassy turns and spins. They promptly won their category to become the first ever ‘Salsa Champs’ South East England Open Amateur Salsa Dance Champions for 2005 - 2006. After this success, Mina had a sudden queue of students lining up to be trained to become the next amateur Salsa champions and, at one point, was training five couples, including Anwar and Catherine, for future competitions. Spurred on by their success, Anwar and Catherine (Ani and Cat) decided to look for another competition that they could enter.
Some months later Ani discovered that the World Cuban Salsa Championships would be taking place in October 2006 in Miami, Florida. With a couple of months to go, on – off training sessions owing to other commitments on both sides and some adjustments to their routine, to make it more ‘Cuban’, Ani and Cat set off to Miami to try their luck once again in the Amateur Category. And, once again, they came home with the first prize, much to the astonishment of the American competitors. Ani and Cat are now the current (2006 – 2007) World Cuban Amateur Salsa Champions.
Meanwhile, by the end of October 2006, another couple were quickly making it clear how serious and committed they were to the Salsa training Mina was giving them. Anupam Deep Singh and Elvira Gheno (again, students that Mina had taught Salsa from scratch, and only since the beginning of 2006) decided to take up the
challenge of entering and attempting to win the Second ‘Salsa Champs’ South East England Open Salsa Dance Championships (Amateur Category) in December 2006, this time in Folkstone, Kent.
As Ani and Cat had already decided to enter the same competition again, but in the Semi-Professional category, the door was open for the possibility of two ‘Salsa Champs’ Championship couples in the QUEEN SALSA camp.
Once again, Mina made sure that Anupam and Elvira had an inspired routine with a sizzling display of fancy footwork, awesome turn patterns and seductively smooth transitions, so all they had to do on competition night was to put on a great show, which they did with great aplomb. Anupam and Elvira wowed the judges and Salsa crowd with a fast-paced, and highly polished, routine to become the second and current (2006 – 2007) ‘Salsa Champs’ South East England Open Amateur Salsa Dance Champions. It was a wonderful and emotional moment in the QUEEN SALSA camp when last year’s Amateur champions, Ani and Cat, handed over the winning trophies to this year’s Amateur champions, Anupam and Elvira.
In the Semi-Professional category, Ani and Cat produced a praise-worthy performance on the night too, even though Ani was suffering from a terrible stomach bug that kept him in bed for most of that day, but were pipped to the post by Kristina and Marian, dancers with the Diablo Dance Company. So, this time, they took second place in their category – still very good going, though. Following on from their recent successes, Ani and Cat have been asked to perform their competition winning routines at various shows by a good number of Salsa promoters in the UK and abroad (Estonia, Spain).
As you can imagine, Mina is extremely proud of her students’ efforts and achievements but, it has to be said, they wouldn’t have achieved these successes so quickly without Mina’s hard work, determination, energy, choreographies and unique teaching style. Once again, she has quite a queue of students wishing to be trained to become the next Salsa Competition Champions (any Competition, of course). I imagine she’s going to be a very busy lady again this year.
For more information about Mina QUEEN SALSA’s weekly classes and party events, click here (for classes) or here (for party events).
Article written by Stephen Elliott (general dogsbody at QUEEN SALSA headquarters)
