Should The Olympics Add “Ballroom Dancing” To It’s Field Of Categories? (New Mark Ballas Interview)
Should the Olympics add “Ballroom Dancing” to it’s field of categories (or any kind of dancing)? I sure think so. If they have Ice Skating And Ice Dancing, etc., why not Ballroom Dancing? Mark Ballas remarked on it in a new interview with OK! Magazine. Do you agree or disagree?
“I think it would be a great Olympic sport, just because we’re athletes,” the hoofer, 26, tells me this week while promoting his gig performing at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Punta Cana’s Summer With The Stars event taking place now through Aug. 16.
“With what we do, we have to train hard, but the technicality is it’s extremely difficult, it’s amazing to watch. It’s like any pair sport — you have synchronized diving and all that kind of stuff. The one thing that would be difficult is making sure the judging was fair.”
Let us know what you think and be sure to read the full interview here. Mark also talks of Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte dancing in the future on Dancing With the Stars as well as his trip to the Dominican Republic to take part in Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Punta Cana’s Summer With The Stars where he’ll join fellow Dancing With The Stars All-Stars competitor Joey Fatone.
If they can have synchro swimming why not ballroom dancing. It already is a competitive sport so it can’t be hard to take the judging from Blackpool or something and use the same system in the Olympics.
I’m neutral on this one, but then I don’t watch events like synchronized swimming, or ice dancing either.
As much as I would love to see Derek Hough dance in the Olympics, the jury is out on that one. I played netball (similar to basketball) at a high standard and the only reason, it is not in the Olympics is because not ever country plays it, which is odd as we have WORLD Championships competition.
Of course it should. Dancers of the highest calibre are every bit the athelete as an Olympian. Even Apollo and many atheletes have commented on the level of difficulty and amount of work required to stay toned and strong for dancing. Ice dancing/pairs skating is an obvious comparison but there is also Rhythmic Gymnastics (in multiples and teams) that has tons of dancing, ballet, etc., and is beautiful to watch, by the way.
Sure why not. Not sure how the elimination would go with potentially very large field of competitors. Sort of like preliminaries then finals I would supposr.
It would be perfect sport to add for summer olympics 2016 considering it will be in Brazil the country the created the Samba can u imagine with the pros from dwts representing their country of origin like Anna dancing for Russia and Maks for the Ukraine and Kym and Peta for team australia and Chelsie and Derek for team USA.
Guys, why do you think Ballroom dancing should be given an advantage? What about all other dance styles/genre??
That’s my fault Alicia. I used the word “Ballroom” to narrow the field down some, but, it could be any kind of dancing.
I think the “other” styles of dance – such as what we see on SYTYCD – wouldn’t work as Olympic sports, particularly not in the same category as Ballroom, because there are no rules. Ballroom has very strict rules. For that reason, I don’t think you would see any DWTS pros on an Olympic team, you would see current Blackpool (and other comps) champions. You’d see current competitors.
Do other styles of dance even have competitions on the level of, say, Blackpool??
From the standpoint of athleticism, ballroom dancing definitely qualifies as an Olympic sport. However, I don’t think real ballroom dancing would have much viewer appeal.
If they did it right, the competition wouldn’t look anything like DWTS (which is the “ballroom dancing” that most of the world has come to know and love). There would be a dance floor full of couples doing their thing. The minute details the judges were scoring would be completely undetectable to the average viewer. So they wouldn’t be able to really judge the competition for themselves. I say this as a non-dancer who’s run across some ballroom competitions on TV. All the couples look great to me, and when the winners are announced, I have no clue whether they deserved the top spot or not.
All that said, maybe they ought to make it a demonstration sport and see how it goes. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. It could be a hit with the viewing public.
Ah, but so very many of the Olympic sports are not very entertaining for the general viewing public. I don’t think that should be a reason to keep it out. The Olympics have something for everything – ballroom should have a spot too. I don’t think anyone can logically argue that ballroom dancers are not athletes.
I don’t watch Summer Olympics myself, but if they can make beach volleyball an Olympic sport, then ballroom dancing should be. I think Mark’s comment about the judging is totally spot on!
I am ambivalent about this though I agree ballroom dancers, dancers in general, are athletes. But I do not want to compare current athletic events because that dismisses IMO the athletic skills involved including beach volleyball. That requires athleticism too. But since more widely accepted sports like baseball is out of the Olympics, not holding my breath on including ballroom.
I don’t see how comparing Ballroom to current sports diminishes those sports – don’t agree at all. If you compare Basketball to Gymnastics, is either one dismissed?
Straight comparison of sports does not diminish anything . Of course it does not diminish it but stated in the context of ” well if that is an Olympic than surely ballroom should be” read to me as if saying that one is less worthy. That might not have been jimmbboe’s intent and maybe I misinterpreted it ( as that can happen considering we are just reading words with no tone ) but that is why I made my comment.
I definitly think dancing should be added as an Olympic sport. BUt I don’t agree that it should be limitied to ballroom dance only. Ballet is extremely difficult. Ballroom dancing is difficult too. And so is tap dancing…..to mention a few. My point is that if dancing were added, and I wish it would be, I think there would have to be a way to make the requirements include several forms of dance. After all, if you going to give GOLD to the best of the best they should be able to do all/several genres of dance. Or have them be required to do mutliple types of dance…..like gymnastics (vault, beam,uneven bars), rhythmic gymnastics (ribbon, clubs, ball), etc. I’m not sure it will ever happen. But why not give it a try and see if it can be defined!
Dancing would be great! Or just having pros working on floor choreo for gymnasts. They are not artistic as much anymore. That would be nice to see. I know Travis did choreo for Nastia’s floor exercise.
…I just don’t think its a “sport”. But, hey, they made ping pong an Olympic sport. And water polo. So why not?
Didn’t the Olympics already consider adding ballroom dancing as an Olympic sport? I think they were calling it “Dancesport”. If any dance form could qualify for the Olympics, I think it would have to be ballroom because of its strict and set rules. It would be very hard to qualify ballet, modern dance, hip hop, etc. for Olympic judging. Ballroom dance is very much like ice dancing without the ice or like rythm gymnastics. I think ballroom dance would be a great addition to the summer Olympics.
I hear ya all the way!
I would say no since it’s so subjective, but so are many Olympic sports.
Ice dance even incorporates a lot of ballroom.
I don’t know how they would go about adding it. It would probably take a lot. I mean, they just got around to adding women’s boxing for goodness sake.