Young Shropshire dancers AJ and Chloe aim for ballroom glory

Now teenage Latin and ballroom dancers AJ Pritchard, 19, and Chloe Hewitt, 18, are preparing to showcase their talents at a major competition.

The duo, who live near Whitchurch, are to compete in the UK Open Championships of dance at the Bournemouth International Centre from January 21.

It comes after a remarkable year, which saw the pair wow judges, including Simon Cowell, with their fancy footwork and nifty moves on Britain's Got Talent.

Since then the talented duo have travelled all over the country winning competitions.

Massive

And they say their recent success is helping them achieve their goal of becoming the top ranked Latin and ballroom dancers in the world.

AJ said: "Since we did the talent show we became the UK Closed Youth Ballroom Champions & Latin Champions 2013. This was a massive feat for us.

"Recently we became The British National Youth Latin Champions 2013 and The British National Youth Ballroom Champions 2013.

"This was amazing as we were first couple to do win both the Latin and the ballroom.

"We recently went to Paris for the World Championships.

"We came fourth in the under 21s in ballroom and made the semi-final in the under 21s in Latin.

"For us we are trying to get to the world number one in ballroom and Latin. We are currently seventh in Latin and fifth in ballroom, so we are nearly there.

"We train about three hours every day. We need to do more training to try to get better results in competitions."

AJ said life has become very hectic for the pair since the ITV talent show.

As well as stepping up training and taking part in the competitions, they were even asked to turn on the Christmas lights in Whitchurch before Christmas.

"Everything has been going amazing for us," he said.

"It has been non-stop recently – we have been travelling up and down the country doing shows and presentation evenings.

"We have been increasing our training in order to prepare us for our competitions.

"We got a phone call to turn the Christmas lights on in Whitchurch – it was amazing.

"It was a weird feeling but it was really good and it was a nice surprise.

"Locally we are quite well known – it's nice when people stop us."

After bowing out in the semi-finals of Britain's Got Talent, the pair missed out on winning the life changing prize of £250,000 and a slot at this year's Royal Variety Performance.

But looking back on their time on the show, AJ said they loved being a part of it and were delighted with the praise they received from the judges.

The duo, who are coached by AJ's dad Adrian at Pritchard Dance and Fitness Academy in Burleydam, were declared "best act of the day" by Simon Cowell when they first auditioned at the Lowry Theatre in Manchester back in February.

The pair are now looking ahead to the British Open Championships at the Winter Gardens, Blackpool in May.

"We have got the British Open Championships at the Winter Gardens, but before that we have got the UK Open Championships at Bournemouth," AJ added.