Breakdancing will make its Olympic debut in the 2024 Paris Olympics

The constant evolution of the Olympic Games tends to mirror the interests of the sporting public through the years and the announcement that breakdancing has captured the imagination of sports fans the world over. Despite being relatively young as an established sport, breaking was introduced to the International Olympic Committee at the World Youth Games in 2018 and has been propelled to Olympic status.

Breaking boundaries

Many sports have tried for generations to break into the Olympic roster yet breaking has been elevated into the Olympic Games relatively quickly. With its origins coming from New York in the 1970’s, breakdancing was initially seen as a street sport–with dancers battling it out in a ‘dance off’ style format.

Whilst breaking has inevitably progressed in notoriety, the principles of the sport are very much the same today and will be carried into the Olympic formatting. 16 men and 16 women from all over the world will compete in knockout, head to head contests. Each competition will culminate in semi-finals and a final, leaving one man and one woman to be crowned as the inaugural Breaking Olympic Champion in Paris in 2024

Jumping the queue

The clamour to become an Olympic Sport has often been the centre of heated debates within the sporting fraternity. With less than 50 years between its inception as a competitive sport and its introduction to the Olympic schedule, many outsiders believe breaking has skipped the line somewhat in becoming an Olympic Sport.

Skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing are three events that are set to debut at the 2021 Olympics in Tokyo along with softball/baseball. However, the IOC have already announced that softball/baseball will be removed from the roster for Paris in 2024.

Better luck next time

There are a plethora of well-established and ‘new’ sports that continue to strive for a place at the Olympics but haven’t managed to get on to the roster yet. Squash has been pioneering for an Olympic berth for almost a century, coming closest to securing a place at the London 2012 games–but the wait continues.

Much like breaking, parkour was seen as a potential Olympic Sport for 2024 but has yet been overlooked. Softball/baseball will also miss the cut in Paris however there is an expectation that it will be back on the roster for the 2028 games in Los Angeles.