While watching a breaking battle at the Silverback Open outside Philadelphia in 2017, I saw a b-boy doing a handstand. It’s a basic move, of course, but this dancer took it a step further by balancing on the backs of his wrists, eliciting excitement from the crowd around the cypher.
When I calmed down and sat back down, I remember thinking, “How on earth can you score a point for an unexpected twist of the wrist, or some other spontaneous display of creativity?” The current state of affairs at the time made the question feel urgent.
Just a year ago, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) announced that breaking would be added to the 2018 Youth Olympic Games, an event often used as a testing ground for new Olympic sports like three-on-three basketball. If breaking performed well in Buenos Aires, there was a good chance it would be included as an all-ages Olympic sport, and it did, so breaking will make its debut in Paris.
The IOC selected the World DanceSport Federation (WDSF) as the governing body for dance as an Olympic sport, an interesting choice considering the WDSF had no prior ties to breaking or the community that gave birth to it. Best known for being in charge of global ballroom dance competitions, the WDSF had about two years to prepare for breaking’s YOG debut, which meant two years to develop and implement an IOC-approved judging system.
In most battles, especially smaller ones, judging is low-tech. There’s an odd number of judges, and after everyone has finished their round (how many depends on the stage of the battle), the judges vote (usually by pointing) for who they think has won. Sometimes one of the judges will cross their arms in an X to indicate that they think two dancers are tied, meaning any judges who aren’t yet decided have to expend more energy (and perhaps some moves they were saving for a later bout) in another round to pick a side.
These votes aren’t based on strict rules; in fact, traditionally there isn’t a rulebook at all. While there is general agreement on some things, like biting other b-boys’ moves (don’t do it), touching your opponent (also don’t do it), and dancing to the rhythm (definitely do it if you can), judges usually evaluate dancers based on values that break with tradition: creativity, style, individuality, musicality. It’s up to each judge, usually a dancer or former dancer, to decide how they evaluate the different values.
This probably won’t work in the Olympics.
Luckily for the WDSF, several years before the IOC got involved in breaking, members of the community had already started building a judging system to be used at major events like Battle of the Year. B-boys Niels “Storm” Robitzke, Kevin “Renegade” Gopy, and8.dance founder Dominic Farr, and a few others had spent years developing a unified and consistent approach to judging breaking, and Farr had developed the platform and technology to execute it. After the YOG was announced, they partnered with the WDSF to fine-tune their approach, which was used at the 2018 YOG. In 2022, Gopy, Robitzke, and Farr stopped working with the WDSF. Since their departure, the WDSF has developed what they call the Olympic Judging System, but they haven’t reinvented the wheel. The system used in Paris is an alternative version of the one Gopy, Robitzke, and Farr created.
