Phoenix Club stars rewarded for efforts with national selection

BOBBY ROLAND and Chloe Dyke depart for Slovenia this weekend to represent Great Britain at the Cadet European Championships. The national selection for the pairing from the Phoenix Artistic Roller Skating Club came after their performances at the British Championships held at the Dolphin Centre in Haywards Heath.

Roland and Dyke gave representation in the Cadet couples championship and performed three compulsory dances, the 14 step, Tudor waltz and swing foxtrot.

In all these dances, the couple showed great depth of edge and technical ability to receive respectable marks from the judges.

The second part to their competition was for them to perform their three-minute free-dance to music from Lord of the Rings.

This was well executed demonstrating flowing and technically difficult moves which challenged them, but with this they again received a pleasing set of marks.

Dyke, along with her team-mate Emilia Bianco, then skated in the cadet solo championships, performing the Tudor waltz and swing foxtrot.

After strong performances in the dances, Bianco was leading the way with Dyke in second place with only the Charleston original set pattern routines to perform.

The Guernsey girls, with everything to strive for, gave lively and entertaining performances.

Dyke persuaded the judges to put her second in this section and, together with her compulsory marks this gave her victory and her fourth solo British title, with Bianco finishing second, an excellent result for the island.

Both girls have now been selected for the Cup of Europe Championships in Portugual next month.

Nicola Roland skated in the youth section of the British Championships in which she had to perform the Kilian and European Waltz, together with a paso doble OSP.

After a nervous start in the Kilian, she slotted into eighth position but following a confident performance in the OSP placed herself seventh overall.

Kirsty Chick represented Phoenix in the junior solo dance event in which she skated the 14 Step and HK Tango and with some good edges and stylish performance she placed herself third at this point.

Moving on to the free-dance section, which this year required set elements to be skated. Chick performed a rhythmic routine and with her points added from the compulsory section slotted her just outside the medals in fourth place.

With this result she has been offered a place on the British Team at the Cup of Europe Championships later in the year.

The final event for the Guernsey club saw Darren Dyke and Chick compete in the senior dance championships with this year's compulsory dances being the Italian foxtrot and Argentine tango.

They put in a strong performance in this element, but were just pushed out of first by two judges to one.

With the aim to move closer to the leaders, they performed their original dance routine which this year is the paso doble and again surprised the leaders and placed them slightly closer to them.

Their final section of the competition was the free-dance and this year the Guernsey couple were eager to perform their lively version of 'Fever'.

They pleased the audience and judges and confirmed their second place overall.

Following on from this event, Dyke and Chick have now been invited to skate for Great Britain in the Senior Europeans in Padova, Italy, at the end of next month.

With both Chick and Chloe Dyke being selected for the couples events at European level they have subsequently been excluded from the Cup of Europe due to the new ruling that couple skaters cannot compete at international events as solo skaters.

The club are extremely proud of these individuals and commend them on their efforts and performances at this years championships.