Saturday Fever

They file in one by one, congregating in a cluster in a corner of the waxy gym floor. Vigorously scuffing the suede underside of their elegant ballroom shoes with a wire brush and unrolling their toned legs, they chat about travel arrangements for next week's trip to Purdue University. The only other sound besides the side whisperings is the clickety-clack of high-heels worn by a loner waltzing across the floor. \n"Can you put on Samba?" asks a flowy-skirted girl of someone sitting near the CD player. \nWith a touch of the play button, the idle students burst out of their cocoons and metamorphose into a fluttering of butterflies, swishing their hips to the beat and gliding across the room effortlessly to the sound of the blaring Brazilian music. With their fervent dancing, the students transform the gymnasium into a ballroom. Soon the ballroom will double as a training facility for these dancers who mean business. \n"Right now they are just warming up, doing drills from each of the different dances," says senior Jasmin Quasniczka, captain of the competitive ballroom dancing team. "Some people practice by themselves, and others work with their partner." \nThe dancers are part of IU's competitive ballroom dance team, Dancesport. The team, open to any student regardless of experience, practices three times a week and spends weekends traveling to competitions across the country. Two weeks ago, the team competed in Champaign, Ill., and are now heading to West Lafayette on Saturday for the Purdue Ballroom Classic. \nIU's Dancesport team saw immense success last year when Quasniczka and Joe Ehlers paired up to win the national championship. \n"The first time we ever danced together was actually at a competition, and it worked so well, we decided to stick together," Quasniczka says. \nAfter dominating the Gold level of competition, they are working toward winning the national title at the next level, Pre-Champ. In competitive ballroom dance, there are six skill levels in which participants may compete. Novices compete in the New-Comer category, elites dance at the Champion level.\nLike other Dancesport couples, Quasniczka and Ehlers specialize in one area of dance and dedicate the majority of their time on the dance floor to perfecting it for competitions. During practice, however, Dancesport members do a range of dances that are under the umbrella of International style of dance. \nThere are two categories in International, Standard and Latin. The Cha Cha, Rumba, Samba, Jive and Pasa Doble are Latin dances, while the Waltz, Foxtrot, Tango, Quickstep, and Vienese Waltz fall under the Standard category. \nBut before mastering the dances, students must find partners with whom they work well. Because of the 2-to-1, female-to-male ratio within the Dancesport team, Quasniczka and other leaders encourage male dancers to have more than one partner. They are trying to recruit more men to the sport, but Quasniczka says it will probably be a long time before the ratio is even.\nStudents don't need a partner when they first come to Dancesport. Dancers of similar skill level and height will be paired up by team leaders, but these factors alone don't necessarily make a good partnership. \n"The most important thing to have in a partner is a compatible personality," says Ehlers. "You have to get along well because you are with them a lot. You also have to have similar ideas about the type of involvement you want to have, you have to have the same motivation and same goals." \nWhile some dancers like Quasniczka and Ehlers are in it to win it, others find that the opportunity to participate in Dancesport affords them an outlet to escape the stress of school work and daily life. \n"While I do take it seriously, and I want to do well at competitions, it's very relaxing," says graduate student Kevin Li. "I was scared when I walked in there for the first time and was like, 'Oh my gosh, these people can really dance.' But everyone was really nice, and I got hooked." \nOne drawback of Dancesport is the high expense it incurs, Ehlers says. In order to allow the opportunity for anyone interested to participate regardless of ability to pay, Dancesport receives some funding from IU and holds fundraisers throughout the year to subsidize some of the costs.\n"Shoes can cost anywhere between 60 and 130 dollars, and you have two pairs, one for Standard and one for Latin dance, and then you have travel fees and entrance fees," Ehlers says. "Ballroom dresses can cost anywhere between a few hundred dollars to 10,000 dollars, and you really do need more than one." \nBecause Dancesport is without a professional coach this year, Quasniczka and Ehlers are giving their own dancing the backseat to coaching. Because the majority of last year's Dancesport members graduated, Quasniczka says their focus will be on rebuilding the team.\nAfter getting the young team on their feet, Quasniczka and Ehlers plan on returning to the highly competitive level of ballroom dance they lived and breathed last year. At times, they devoted 20 hours a week to perfecting their choreography. This year they aspire to become "10-dancers", meaning they will be judged on all 10 International style dances rather than just one or two.\n"I like helping coach the team and watching them improve, but when you are focusing on something of your own advancement, it is really rewarding, and I am excited to get back into that," Quasniczka says.