So proud of the Hartlepool crews at the UK hip hop finals

Dance crews from Hartlepool Urban Rockz, based at Val Armstrong’s School of Performing Arts on Whitby Street South, competed in the the UK Hip Hop Dance event.

Zac Healey, a teacher at the academy, said: “The weekend was a massive success.

“We took four crews to the competition and they all performed brilliantly on the first day of prelims and scored high enough to make it through to the finals on the Sunday.”

Teams competing were Shadowz in Junior, Rocsquad and DMND Mob both in Varsity and Ruff Diamond in the Adult division.

Zac added: “Shadowz, competed in their first ever Junior Division, with some members aged just nine and 10-years-old competing against children aged 12 and 13.”

The group excelled and won a silver medal, meaning they have qualified in the top three junior crews in the UK. The team will also travel to the World Hip Hop Dance Championships in August along with dance crew Ruff Diamond.

Unfortunately both Rocsquad and the DMND Mob missed out on the top three places in the Varsity Division.

Zac, who also competed with crew Ruff Diamond - taking first place in the Adult Division - said: “Despite this, myself and their other teachers who make up the Ruff Diamond boys, were incredibly proud of how both crews danced in what was the most hotly-contested division this year.

“The standard was incredible, truly, with 11 of the best teenage crews in the whole country pushing for the top three, including last years sixth place crew in the world. I loved the weekend as did all of our kids. It was another example of Hartlepool children travelling nationwide to excel in their passion. They represented the town and Urban Rockz with absolute distinction.”

There were individual achievements with Ruff Diamond member Thomas Armstrong winning silver in ‘locking’ and gold in ‘popping.’ The silver medal in ‘popping’ went to Zac Healey, while the two versus two gold medals went to Thomas Armstrong and Charlie Eve.

Shadowz crew member Archie Riley took gold in beginners locking and fellow member Josh Youll took silver. In beginner popping, Shadowz member Jack Gardener took gold and Josh Youll silver.

In ‘beginner 2 versus 2’ Jack Gardener and Rhys Aveyard from Shadowz took gold.