Af­ter an 18-year ab­sence, the Na­tion­al Lim­bo Com­pe­ti­tion made a pow­er­ful and emo­tion­al re­turn on Sat­ur­day night, re­claim­ing its place as one of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s most sig­nif­i­cant cel­e­bra­tions of dance her­itage, in­no­va­tion and ex­cel­lence.

Staged by the Na­tion­al Dance As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (NDA), the 2026 edi­tion of the com­pe­ti­tion formed a flag­ship event in the As­so­ci­a­tion’s 45th an­niver­sary year. Held at the John Cu­pid Car­ni­val Vil­lage, Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah, the re­launch was both sym­bol­ic and strate­gic—reaf­firm­ing lim­bo not on­ly as spec­ta­cle, but as a dis­ci­plined per­for­mance art root­ed in rit­u­al, re­sis­tance and in­ter­gen­er­a­tional knowl­edge.

The event was pro­duced in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC), with en­dorse­ment from the Min­istry of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment (MC­CD), and sup­port from the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA), through the Mul­ti­cul­tur­al Unit in the Di­vi­sion of Ed­u­ca­tion, Re­search and Tech­nol­o­gy. To­ba­go’s pres­ence was es­pe­cial­ly vis­i­ble, in­clud­ing per­for­mances by To­ba­go Al­pha Dance Acad­e­my and stu­dents of the Dance in School Pro­gramme.

With $100,000 in cash prizes on of­fer—to be paid out by the NCC—the com­pe­ti­tion at­tract­ed some of the coun­try’s most ac­com­plished cul­tur­al groups, blend­ing tech­ni­cal mas­tery with the­atri­cal flair.

When the fi­nal scores were tal­lied, North West Laven­tille Cul­tur­al Move­ment emerged as over­all cham­pi­ons, walk­ing away with the Ju­lia Ed­wards Chal­lenge Tro­phy and the top prize of $50,000. The group al­so held the cham­pi­onship ti­tle at the last na­tion­al lim­bo com­pe­ti­tion in 2008, mak­ing their 2026 win a rare and sym­bol­ic re­ten­tion of the crown fol­low­ing the event’s re­in­state­ment.

To­ba­go Burn se­cured sec­ond place and $20,000, while Twin Inc claimed third place and $10,000, un­der­scor­ing the depth and com­pet­i­tive­ness of the field.

Be­yond over­all plac­ings, the com­pe­ti­tion placed de­lib­er­ate em­pha­sis on recog­nis­ing in­di­vid­ual ex­cel­lence and cul­tur­al lin­eage. Shaquille Mitchell was crowned King of Lim­bo, earn­ing the Ver­non Hope Chal­lenge Tro­phy and $5,000. The tro­phy ho­n­ours Ver­non Hope—a re­spect­ed cul­tur­al prac­ti­tion­er and lim­bo ad­vo­cate who danced along­side and learned from Ju­lia Ed­wards, the Moth­er of Lim­bo. Hope is still ac­tive in the cul­tur­al space, and his nam­ing was a con­scious de­ci­sion by the NDA to ho­n­our a liv­ing icon whose men­tor­ship helped shape na­tion­al com­pet­i­tive stan­dards.

The Queen of Lim­bo ti­tle went to Quisha Christo­pher Davis, who re­ceived the Ny­dia “Fire Queen” By­ron Chal­lenge Tro­phy and $5,000. By­ron, an in­ter­na­tion­al­ly recog­nised lim­bo dancer trained un­der Ju­lia Ed­wards, was renowned for ad­vanc­ing fire-based lim­bo per­for­mance and rep­re­sent­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go glob­al­ly, in­clud­ing with the Uni­ver­soul Cir­cus. Her lega­cy bridges tech­ni­cal bril­liance, sto­ry­telling and in­ter­na­tion­al cul­tur­al diplo­ma­cy.

Ad­di­tion­al awards went to Soul Oa­sis Cul­tur­al Am­bas­sadors (SO­CA) for Most Cre­ative Pre­sen­ta­tion, while North West Laven­tille Cul­tur­al Move­ment dom­i­nat­ed oth­er cat­e­gories, tak­ing Most Orig­i­nal Hu­man Barre, Best Cos­tume, and fur­ther ce­ment­ing their rep­u­ta­tion for in­no­va­tion and pol­ish.

The evening’s emo­tion­al cen­tre came with the fea­ture ad­dress by NDA Pres­i­dent Ar­lette Liz Williams, who framed the com­pe­ti­tion as both a cul­tur­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty and a turn­ing point.

“We in­her­it the fu­ture by how care­ful­ly we ho­n­our the past… and how brave­ly we step for­ward to­geth­er,” Williams told the au­di­ence, de­scrib­ing the NDA’s role as one of stew­ard­ship rather than sta­tus. She traced the of­ten-un­com­fort­able ori­gins of dance in Trinidad and To­ba­go, em­pha­sis­ing that the re­launch of the na­tion­al lim­bo com­pe­ti­tion sig­nalled in­clu­sion, open­ness and cre­ative courage.

Williams paid trib­ute to cul­tur­al gi­ants who shaped the art form, in­clud­ing Ver­non Hope, for­mer NDA pres­i­dent Emel­da Lynch-Grif­fith, and Lucy Mar­garet Reg­is of Na­tion Folk­ness NAR­O­D­NOST, ac­knowl­edg­ing their in­flu­ence on dis­ci­pline, lead­er­ship and ad­vo­ca­cy with­in the dance com­mu­ni­ty. She al­so un­der­scored the NDA’s man­date un­der its Act of Par­lia­ment, stress­ing ac­count­abil­i­ty, vol­un­teerism and na­tion­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty.

“In our 45th year, we ex­tend an open in­vi­ta­tion to all of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” she said. “Walk with us. Ques­tion with us. Build with us.”