Pole Dance - Pole Dance Competitions

Pole Dance Competitions

A wide range of amateur and professional competitions are held in many countries around the world. They are strictly non-nude and focus on pole dance as an athletic and artistic form of dance and fitness. The first "Miss Pole Dance World" competition was held in November 2005 in Amsterdam and Elena Gibson from the UK won the championship. The following day Elena was disqualified by the organizer John Benner amongst much controversy and the title went to the runner up Reiko Suemune from Japan.

A group of advocates are even pushing for pole dance to be represented as a test event in the 2012 London Olympics. But because this is a relatively new trend, scoring for competitions is not standardised, while names of the techniques vary among different clubs in different regions.

In Australia, "Miss Pole Dance Australia" was started in 2005. Felix Cane took home the first prize in the latest 2010 (named Miss Pole Dance 2011—for the coming year) competition. The first US Pole Dance Federation (USPDF) Championship was held on March 19, 2009, first place was taken by Jenyne Butterfly. The 2010 winner of "Miss Pole Dance Canada" was Crystal Lai, who went on to win the People's Choice Award at the worlds. World Pole Sport & Fitness 2009 (World Pole Dance), which was held in Jamaica and opened to all nationalities, was won by Australian Felix Cane. World Pole Sport & Fitness 2010 which took place in Switzerland and was opened to all nationalities, was again won by Australian Felix Cane. World Pole Sport & Fitness 2011, which took place in Budapest and was opened to all nationalities and all continents, was won by Alesia Vazmitsel representing Belarus.