Everett dancers win gold at one of world’s largest championships

In their home studio in Everett last week, Erik Linder and Rickie Taylor danced. Again and again.

Don’t world championship ballroom dancers get time off?

“We had a week at Christmas,” Erik said. “It was almost too much. We were ready to get back to work.”

Erik and Rickie, Snohomish County’s dancing darlings, now both 14, earned gold medals for the United States at the World Dance Council amateur league world championships near Paris in early December.

The dancers, longtime national champions, placed first out of 50 couples in the under-16 standard ballroom dance competition. The runners-up included well-known dancers from England, Russia and Ukraine, along with their friends (and archrivals) Kinsley Lin and Michelle Yiu from San Francisco.

After the big win, Erik and Rickie qualified to participate in the World DanceSport Federation’s Baltic Grand Prix in Riga, Latvia. In between, they participated in the federation’s international dance festival in mid-December in Horsens, Denmark, again taking first place. Sport dancing is a bit different than classical ballroom dance, with an emphasis on athletic moves, Erik said. On Dec. 20 in Riga, they placed 10th out of 60 couples.

Even so, because the World Dance Council’s Paris competition is so highly esteemed, Erik and Rickie are now rated the No. 1 standard ballroom dancers in their age category in the world.

In Paris, their goal simply was to make it to the semi-finals, and that they did.

“We were unknown to these judges,” Rickie said. “We did not expect anything.”

In the finals round, with five other couples competing, Erik and Rickie were just happy to be there.

“We danced our best and tried to enjoy the moment,” Rickie said.

So the teens were surprised to get the gold.

“Coming into the finals, I didn’t care what place we received,” Erik said. “But when we got first, it felt good. I never expected us to win our first time in Paris.”

Rickie and Erik surmise that one of the reasons they won is that they work hard at having fun instead of competing.

“We at least want to give the appearance of having fun,” Rickie said. “Really, we enjoyed it. That’s why we won.”

Erik agreed.

“Making it look effortless, like we just showed up to dance, is one of our strengths,” he said.

In 2014, the couple danced in more than 20 competitions around the country and overseas. The contest schedule begins again this month, with competitions in Portland and San Jose.

“Our win in Paris is motivating us even more than before,” Rickie said.

“We want to keep it going,” said Erik.

Erik, of Lake Stevens, and Rickie, of Edmonds, have been dancing together since age 4. The dance partners won the first of their five national championships when they were just 7.

Soon after, they appeared in a segment about talented kids on the “Oprah Winfrey Show.”

At age 9, they were semi-finalists on the “America’s Got Talent” contest show. They appeared at age 10 on “Dancing With The Stars,” drawing the praise of judges Len Goodman, Carrie Ann Inaba and Bruno Tonioli.

Coached by Ruslan Kaliuzhnyi, Kseniya Sovenko and Alexandria Hawkins at Everett’s First Class Ballroom, the duo specialize in the waltz, tango, Viennese waltz, foxtrot, quickstep, cha-cha-cha, samba, rumba, paso doble and jive.

Erik said he doesn’t know what to do with himself when he’s not in the studio.

“I want to dance and compete for the rest of my life,” he said.

New year, same goal

Dance partners Erik Linder and Rickie Taylor plan to present some fund-raising exhibitions this year to help them return to Paris to defend their world championship title. In the meantime, people who want to support the duo can write to Maria Kordit, CBZ Foundation, kordmar@gmail.com or find out more at www.cbzfoundation.org. To watch a video of Erik and Rickie from their recent European tour, go to www.erikandrickie.com/videos.html. New year, same goal

Gale Fiege: 425-339-3427; gfiege@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @galefiege.