At the foot of the Concorde obelisk, 5,800 excited spectators eagerly await the arrival on stage of Sya Dembélé. At just 16 years old, the young French dancer has just qualified, on Friday, August 9, for the quarter-finals of breakdancing at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. After several rounds during the afternoon, during which she brilliantly imposed herself against her opponents, B-girl Syssy – her stage name, preceded by B-girl for “breaking girl” – finally launches herself onto the parquet covered in black linoleum, specially installed for the occasion in the center of the capital. Concentrated, she seems ready to do battle with her competitor from Japan, the double world champion Ami Yuasa, nicknamed B-girl Ami. The stakes are high: if she wins all three rounds of the battle, the teenager will secure a place in the semi-finals – one step closer to a possible historic medal.
Acclaimed by spectators of all ages, the energetic and agile dancer contorts herself, performs figures on the floor, and perfectly follows the rhythm of the music. For this competition, her performances are judged by nine judges, who carefully monitor the execution of each movement, but also her creativity, technique and rhythm. An additional difficulty: none of the B-girls know in advance the music that will be mixed by the DJ during their performances. Overlooking the stage, the latter ensures an electric atmosphere by playing one song after another, during the three respective rounds of the two competitors. Each time Sya Dembélé touches the ground, the French supporters encourage her with loud applause and screams. But nothing works – Ami Yuasa wins the battle, winning three rounds to zero.
In the audience, Ophélie doesn’t stop applauding. This young dance enthusiast, who chose to attend the women’s final “for France’s great chances of medals”, says she is “already very happy to have gotten this far”. “The level is incredible, she clearly didn’t disgrace herself. And above all, it’s great that we’re opening up the Olympics to other horizons by offering breakdancing!” exclaims the spectator. The one who hadn’t watched the Games for years was won over by the new disciplines offered for this 2024 edition, and doesn’t seem disappointed by the show: “I discovered some gems, including Syssy. And the atmosphere is so incredible, it really makes you want to take a closer look at breakdancing. I hope this won’t be the last time we see this competition at the Olympics!”
“It was obvious”
For Ophélie, as for the nearly 6,000 other spectators gathered under the obelisk of the Concorde, this show is rare and unprecedented. Breakdancing, a discipline born in the streets of New York in the 1970s, had never been represented at the Olympic Games until now. “Basically, it’s a culture that comes from the gangs of the Bronx neighborhood, who solved some of their problems through dance battles,” summarizes dancer Thomas Ngom, aka B-boy FlowAngel, member of the Break Dance Crew collective. The movement crossed the Atlantic, then was taken up by French dancers in the early 1980s, who were inspired by the movements seen on VHS cassettes that were passed from hand to hand.
“They would pause on poor quality videos filmed in the depths of certain neighborhoods in the United States, then dissect and reproduce the figures a thousand times. There were no breakdancing schools yet, no teachers, no recognition of this dance, no official competitions,” explains Thomas Ngom. The discipline, practiced by a handful of initiates, was then very far from the polished image of the Olympic Games – and the dancers of the time would never have believed they would see it added to the program of such an international competition.
But over time, breakdancing became professionalized all over the world, and a number of championships emerged. In France, more and more dance schools offered breaking classes, and dozens of groups and associations trained future breakers. At the same time, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has been trying, since the early 2010s, to modernize its somewhat outdated image, in particular by allowing host countries to offer a series of additional sports at each Olympics. These disciplines, chosen by the organizers and validated by the IOC based on various criteria – parity, cost and complexity of organization, commitment of the athletes or even safety of the athletes – are contested for the duration of an Olympics, with no guarantee of being maintained at the following Games. This is how baseball, softball and karate, widely practiced in Japan, made their return to the Tokyo Olympics in 2021, or women’s boxing was added to the programme of the London Games in 2012.
When the organizers of the Paris Olympics were studying the possible additional sports to select for 2024, the choice of breakdancing was then “obvious”, Aurélie Merle, director of sports competitions for Paris 2024, told L’Express. “We wanted sports that aligned with the DNA of what Paris 2024 was going to be, that were complementary to existing disciplines, attractive to young people, practicable by the greatest number, and outside of traditional frameworks. Climbing, streetpark skateboarding, surfing, and of course breaking met these requirements”, she explains. Especially since during the Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires in 2018, where breakdancing was represented for the first time, the quality of the performances of the French dancers and the attraction of the youngest for the discipline caught the eye of the Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games (OCOG). “There were incredible performances, this idea of sport in the city centre, which could be enjoyed simply by pressing the play button on the radio,” says Aurélie Merle.
“It’s cool to be able to open up to the world”
“It’s also a political decision, like everything related to the Games,” emphasizes Eric Monnin, sports sociologist and historian, director of the University Olympic Study and Research Center. “By proposing breaking, we are getting closer to the concepts of an intercultural, intergenerational, more modern sport, which is completely in line with the IOC’s wishes since the early 2010s… Not to mention that we had a good chance of medals in this discipline, with a pool of very competent athletes,” he explains. The National Dance Federation (FFD) agrees. “It’s a young, popular discipline, very present on social networks, which doesn’t require large infrastructures, is demanding in terms of sport and has a real cultural background, which is everything that the COJO and the IOC wanted,” emphasizes Charles Ferreira, president of the FFD.
To make a spectacular entrance into the Olympic world, the sector nevertheless had to adapt. Charles Ferreira still remembers the call from the World DanceSport Federation (WDSF), which urged him, a few months before the 2018 Youth Olympics, to organize official French selections for the competition. “We had to move very quickly, organize selections in all the countries… In France, we had to do our selections on video to save time, which was quite unusual,” says the director. A hasty organization, which nevertheless brought luck to France: in Buenos Aires in 2018, dancer Martin Lejeune won a silver medal. Above all, the success of the Youth Olympics has largely helped to showcase the discipline throughout the world, including in France.
“We’ve had a lot of requests for interviews, especially from media outlets that would never have called us before. But also institutional requests to put on shows and performances, requests to join our associations, requests for information on the discipline… It’s cool to be able to open up to the world like that,” comments Thomas Ngom. However, at first, some dancers remained perplexed about the presence of breakdancing at the Olympics. “It was a bit controversial, because some were afraid that it wouldn’t really be representative of the discipline. But nothing has been smoothed over: we can compete under our own names [surnoms donnés à chaque danseur, NDLR] and do all the movements we want,” reassures the dancer.
Aurélie Merle confirms: the director of sports competitions has had to endure some criticism, but fully assumes her choice. “From the beginning, our project has been bold: we wanted to break the codes, propose new things, which always involves questions or interrogations. But we are delighted to demonstrate that our choice was the right one”, she says. And for good reason: on this Friday, August 9, the packed stadium on the Place de la Concorde exults when Ami Yuasa wins the first Olympic gold medal in the history of breakdancing, against the Lithuanian Dominika Banevič (Bgirl Nickla) – who did not disgrace herself. Despite the defeat of the French, the stadium is standing, and blue-white-red flags wave in the setting sun. The real victory is for world breakdancing.
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