Victor 'B-Boy' Montalvo will be the United States’ first-ever Olympic breaking representative this summer.
the most yellow vehicle in Los Angeles County, a 1987 Mitsubishi SUV he just purchased off of Craigslist. He pulls through the security gate at a sprawling Santa Monica office compound, parks, and removes a gold chain and ring he bought in India last year. The sunglasses stay on. Just back from Japan, he’s jet-lagged as hell. “I swear it’s not a hangover,” he says, chuckling. “Just feels that way.” But alas, he must train.
He’s also quiet, humble, steady. “I have made it so far from where I started,” he says. “Gold is the last possible thing to achieve. And this is probably my only chance.” The scene quickly died out in Mexico, however, leaving Victor Sr. and Hector to sate their artistic passions by starting a heavy-metal band. In time they made a new home, near their mother in Kissimmee, Florida, where Victor Sr. worked as a cook.with his son, he saw the music and dancing do the same thing to his boy it had once done to him, young Victor’s eyes glued wide to the screen. “You know,” his father said, “I used to do that, too.
Breaking has four core elements. “Top rock” refers to movements while standing. “Part of top rock” includes footwork — self-explanatory. “Down rock” means moves done on the floor. “Freeze” is any moment when a breaker, well, freezes, usually while holding an unusual position. Down rock is the most crucial element, comprising myriad movements including spins, footwork, transitions, and power moves in which breakers spin their bodies on hands, elbows, shoulders, or their backs or heads.
IN 2008, when Montalvo was 14, he went to his first major breaking event, Outbreak, in Orlando, organized by the legendary David “MexOne” Alvarado. “I saw so many breakers that were so different and original,” Montalvo says. “They just had this dope aura around them.” They’d throw down with nothing between their skin and the street, art becoming scars. “People would get bald spots on their head,” Montalvo says, remembering videos his father showed him as a boy. “It was a pride thing.”
The music mattered as much as the dance moves, with the rapper Afrika Bambaataa and R&B-jazz-funk fusion group the Blackbyrds and the Godfather of Soul himself, James Brown, fueling young Montalvo’s long days and nights in the studio. He’d feel the music moving his body, often leaving him little say in the matter.
His mother, Maria Guadalupe Montalvo, and Hector told him he couldn’t do it; Victor Sr. argued with them. “They are paying for the freaking plane tickets and the hotel,” he reasoned. “I don’t have money to give him that. They are going to make it so where he can travel to Europe. What the hell are you talking about he can’t do it?”
BUT THE PATH WAS fraught. Once, a man claiming to be some sort of manager paid Montalvo’s way to El Salvador to judge a competition. “I shouldn’t have gone,” says Montalvo, who adds that the man ended up trying to manipulate him into giving up opportunities — while doing free work for him. “But it was a free chance to see more of the world.”
Breaking’s fan base swelled. Events drew tens of thousands. Gyms filled. Livestreams pulled hundreds of thousands of viewers. Breakers began signing modest sponsorship deals. But heartbreak conquers all. In 2015, breaking up with a longtime girlfriend left Montalvo feeling lost and depressed. Alvarado helped him course-correct, taking Montalvo to competitions by way of road trips, creating hours of conversation and mentorship.
The Red Bull BC One America Finals in his home region of Orlando. The inaugural Silverback Open in Philadelphia and the largest single-event prize — $15,000 — in breaking. The Freestyle Session World Finals in California. Then came the Red Bull BC One World Final in Italy, where Montalvo won a world title, becoming what he wrote on that apple when he was 10, the best B-boy in the world.
IN 2016, MONTALVO MET Kate Pavlenko, “B-Girl Kate,” in New York. An athletic, blue-eyed, brown-haired breaker from Ukraine, she had won a number of regional events and held her own near the top of the ranks worldwide. They bonded over a shared love of jazz and funk music. They grabbed drinks, went dancing, and spent days on end together.
“It’s rough,” says Schreibman. “Every other weekend, you’re in an arena, and a guy’s standing 100 feet away from you, and he’s gonna do the same moves you saw last weekend, the music’s gonna be the same as the weekend before.”Creating further strain: Montalvo had become a full-fledged global celebrity in the breaking world, now with hordes of fans. A 2018 China visit left him disturbed when a group of breaking fans manhandled him as he left an event.
RETURNING TO COMPETITION went well enough at first, so well that Montalvo again won the Red Bull BC One World Finals in 2022, claiming another belt. Through the first half of 2023, however, Montalvo entered three separate Olympic-qualifying events, and finished in third place each time. Doubt arose. “I didn’t know if I could make it,” he says. “I gave myself all this pressure.”
“She forced me to put ’em on,” Montalvo says. But when he put on the bigger shoes they felt good. “Ended up being the perfect size.” “I think I’ve surprised myself,” he says. “I’m like, ‘Damn, I can’t believe I’ve been able to do this.’” “Some of the heart and soul is gone,” Schreibman says. “My fear is that people are going to see a bunch of people onstage dancing to mechanical music and think that’s breaking, and that’s not what’s really awesome about this culture.… That’s the counterculture side people don’t see unless they go out and see it.
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