Youth America Grand Prix | Our Honest YAGP Experience: What Parents Should Know

So why we went to YAGP? Our son was doing Belgian competitions and he won a lot and that sounds like a good problem but for us it was not because he was doing the local recreational competitions in Belgium and He took first place in almost all of them.

And there was not so much challenge for him anymore.

And he started feeling bad and awkward for his fellow dancers.

I remember we were sitting in a circle holding hands during awards.

And then they would say, and the first prize goes to, and they would mention his name.

And instead of him feeling proud, he started feeling, I wouldn't say ashamed, but he started feeling bad for his friends who were also wishing to get that first prize.

So we tried to think about what could solve this issue.

So we decided to go to an international competition, you know, where the stakes would be higher.

But by the time we decided, I think the YAGP regionals were done with.

And unfortunately, it was closed for the season.

So the virtual round was the last competition left.

So I said like, hey, let's just record a video and just send it in.

We never know.

So we took that chance.

We did that over a weekend, filmed it and set it off.

And yeah, he did well.

He placed well.

And I think he got like, Top two, he was second in ballet and I think it was like, yeah, also like second in contemporary.

I think it was about a week later that we got an email and we were back home in Belgium and email said, hey, congratulations on your success with the virtual competition last weekend.

You have been invited to be part of the New York finals next April.

We were so excited.

That was like really beautiful news and we were super happy.

And at the same time, we were also a little bit stressed because we had two weeks to decide, are we going to do this or not? And that decision was a little bit less romantic.

What we said to each other was that this was probably the first and the last chance that we would get to go out there and to go and experience that.

So we decided as a family, let's just take this chance with both hands.