Victor Montalvo was 17 when he headed off to his first international battle. The competition was at one of the largest hip-hop dance festivals in the world, the Notorious IBE in the Netherlands. Victor didn't even have a passport. The longest flight he'd ever taken from Florida was to Illinois. But by that point, breaking-or as it's better known, by its popular misnomer, breakdancing had already become his life.
Victor, now 30, who competes as B-Boy Victor, inherited his love for the dance from his father, Victor Sr., a B-boy who formed a crew with his twin brother, Hector, in Mexico in the 1980s. Growing up, Victor Jr. always understood breaking as a family affair, with his three siblings and cousins taking turns on the cardboard. (Now and then, his dad will still "bust out a couple moves, like, 'Yo, let me get the cardboard. Where's the cardboard? Put it on the floor.' And then he sets himself up to hit the backspin," Victor Jr. says. "That's all he can do anymore.") But during the noughties in Victor Jr.'s hometown of Kissimmee, Florida, breaking wasn't more than a niche interest. "None of my classmates ever took it seriously," he recalls. "I was just like 'the dancer kid.""
This story is from the June - July 2024 edition of Harper's BAZAAR - US.
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This story is from the June - July 2024 edition of Harper's BAZAAR - US.
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