Suzuki World Cup championship

American Fitness, July-August, 1994 by Ayn Nix

It was a long road to victory for the winners of the Suzuki World Cup '94 5th Annual International Aerobic Championship, held last April in Sendagaya, Tokyo, Japan. All competitors first won national championships in their own countries and placed in one of three regional championships--the Asia-Oceania in Indonesia, the Pan-American in Brazil or the Pan-European in Hungary.

More than 100 athletes from 27 countries participated in the event organized by the International Aerobic Federation and Japan Aerobic Federation. Ten athletes and teams from each of four categories (women's individual, men's individual, mixed doubles and triples) were chosen in the preliminaries. The finals narrowed the field to six competitors from each category.

"It was an honor to win the Suzuki World Cup Championship," says Sue Stanley of Australia, women's individual winner for the second year in a row. "The standards of the competition in all categories seem to get higher every year."

Each competitor's two-minute freestyle routine was evaluated by an international judging panel headed by Suzanne Dion Guhin. For all categories, technical merit accounts for 60% and artistic impression for 40% of total scores. Alignment, execution, intensity and difficulty, skill, music, choreography and originality are judged. For doubles and triples routines, synchronicity is also a factor.

After each performance, the more than 3,500 spectators in attendance watched instant replays of each routine on the arena's electronic scoreboard. On the second day, before finals got underway, an open exercise session was held. More than 200 aerobics enthusiasts filled the gymnasium floor to bounce, jog and kick their way through a 60-minute aerobic routine led by three of Japan's leading instructors.

Aerobics competition combines friendship and emotion, and the championship is a way to meet aerobic athletes from around the world, according to triples champions Gilberto Faria Raposo Lopes, Ary Marues and Ruy Faria Amadei. The team won by a narrow margin of .01 of a point over the second place challengers in their category.

And the Winners Are... Women's Individual

FIRST: Sue Stanley (Australia)

SECOND: Carmen Valderas (Spain)

THIRD: Greice Kerche (Brazil)

FOURTH: Andreia Moreno (Brazil)

FIFTH: Andrea Simko (Hungary)

SIXTH: Paula M. Santa Cruz (Argentina)

Men's Individual

FIRST: Kenichiro Nomura (Japan)

SECOND: Magnus Scheving (Iceland)

THIRD: Kiyofumi Yamamoto (Japan)

FOURTH: Paulo Roberto Dos Santos (Brazil)

FIFTH: Diego Arteaga (Argentina)

SIXTH: Anton Scott (Australia)

Doubles

FIRST: Maria Aparecida Santos and Weidy Barbosa Leite (Brazil)

SECOND: Jorgelina Bisso and Ulises Puiggros (Argentina)

THIRD: Stael Martins de Moraes and Michel das Neves (Brazil)

FOURTH: Sandra Evelyn Arriagada and Jaime Edson Salgado (Chile)

FIFTH: Alba De Las Heras and Jonatan Canadas (Spain)

SIXTH: Chisato Nonaka and Yoshinobu Kawabata (Japan)

Triples

FIRST: Gilberto Faria Raposo Lopes, Ary Marques and Ruy Faria Amadei (Brazil)

SECOND: Pedro Pozo, Alexis Cortes and Daniel Castro (Chile)

THIRD: Jorge Risetti, Roberto Milillo and Claudio Melamed (Argentina)

FOURTH: Ronaldo Friedl, Celso Cunihiro and Marcelo Capdevila (Brazil)

FIFTH: Marta Puig, Ana Moliner and Sonia Anton (Spain)

SIXTH: Paula Allan, Bev Carter and Gina Good (Australia)