Taiwanese break dancer Sun Chen (孫振) on Sunday secured his place as Taiwan’s first B-boy to compete in Olympic breakdancing after taking part in the second leg of the discipline’s qualifier series in Budapest, Hungary.
With breakdancing making its debut as an event at the quadrennial summer Olympics, a two-part Olympic Qualifier Series was held in Shanghai, China, and Budapest to finalize the competitors in four “urban sports” disciplines announced by the International Olympic Committee
The other three events were BMX freestyle, skateboarding and sport climbing, all of which debuted at the Olympics after 2000.
Photo courtesy of Red Bull
After a two-year selection process and competitive events, 40 B-boys (male break dancers) and 40 B-girls (female break dancers) were chosen to compete against each other from May 16 to May 19 in Shanghai, followed by the most recent dance-off from Thursday last week to Sunday in Budapest, to vie for a chance to compete in the inaugural breakdancing event at the Olympics.
Breakers placing in the top seven from the combined rankings in Shanghai and Budapest qualified to compete in Paris next month.
Taiwan’s Sun, better known as “B-boy Quake,” placed 10th overall.
He first placed seventh when competing with a leg injury last month in Shanghai, taking painkillers to help dance through the pain.
However, after reaching the quarter-finals, Sun was outdanced by China’s Qi Xiangyu (亓祥宇).
In Budapest, after dancing his way into the round-of-16, Sun on Sunday competed against other B-boys from the US, the Netherlands and Ukraine, but was unable to make it into the quarter-finals and placed 15th.
With a combined score of 60 out of 100, Sun took 10th place, securing his qualification for Paris.
The National Olympic Committees placed a limit of two dancers from each country in the qualifiers, which ensured Sun’s inclusion after Japan and the US exceeded their quota.
Sun released a statement through his agency saying he is honored to represent Taiwan next month, adding that he would do his best to do justice to his dream of competing at the Olympics.
Born on Sept. 21, 1999 — the day Taiwan was hit by a major earthquake measuring magnitude 7.3 on the Richter scale which caused widespread destruction and killed 2,456 people while injuring 10,718 — the character of Sun’s first name means “vibrate” in Mandarin. His English nickname is Quake.
Sun’s coach Su Chih-peng (蘇志鵬) said Quake was under a lot of pressure before Budapest as he had just recovered from his leg injury.
Su added that after Sun’s qualification, he hoped the nation would begin to value breakdancing as a sport and do more to cultivate it.
“There are many countries in the world, and yet Taiwan was able to make it to the Olympics,” he said.
“The achievement was not easy, but it also allows the world to see Taiwan’s breaking and the sport could be further cultivated, so one day maybe more people can represent Taiwan,” he added.
A year-long renovation of Taipei’s Bangka Park (艋舺公園) began yesterday, as city workers fenced off the site and cleared out belongings left by homeless residents who had been living there. Despite protests from displaced residents, a city official defended the government’s relocation efforts, saying transitional housing has been offered. The renovation of the park in Taipei’s Wanhua District (萬華), near Longshan Temple (龍山寺), began at 9am yesterday, as about 20 homeless people packed their belongings and left after being asked to move by city personnel. Among them was a 90-year-old woman surnamed Wang (王), who last week said that she had no plans
TO BE APPEALED: The environment ministry said coal reduction goals had to be reached within two months, which was against the principle of legitimate expectation The Taipei High Administrative Court on Thursday ruled in favor of the Taichung Environmental Protection Bureau in its administrative litigation against the Ministry of Environment for the rescission of a NT$18 million fine (US$609,570) imposed by the bureau on the Taichung Power Plant in 2019 for alleged excess coal power generation. The bureau in November 2019 revised what it said was a “slip of the pen” in the text of the operating permit granted to the plant — which is run by Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) — in October 2017. The permit originally read: “reduce coal use by 40 percent from Jan.
China might accelerate its strategic actions toward Taiwan, the South China Sea and across the first island chain, after the US officially entered a military conflict with Iran, as Beijing would perceive Washington as incapable of fighting a two-front war, a military expert said yesterday. The US’ ongoing conflict with Iran is not merely an act of retaliation or a “delaying tactic,” but a strategic military campaign aimed at dismantling Tehran’s nuclear capabilities and reshaping the regional order in the Middle East, said National Defense University distinguished adjunct lecturer Holmes Liao (廖宏祥), former McDonnell Douglas Aerospace representative in Taiwan. If
‘SPEY’ REACTION: Beijing said its Eastern Theater Command ‘organized troops to monitor and guard the entire process’ of a Taiwan Strait transit China sent 74 warplanes toward Taiwan between late Thursday and early yesterday, 61 of which crossed the median line in the Taiwan Strait. It was not clear why so many planes were scrambled, said the Ministry of National Defense, which tabulated the flights. The aircraft were sent in two separate tranches, the ministry said. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Thursday “confirmed and welcomed” a transit by the British Royal Navy’s HMS Spey, a River-class offshore patrol vessel, through the Taiwan Strait a day earlier. The ship’s transit “once again [reaffirmed the Strait’s] status as international waters,” the foreign ministry said. “Such transits by
RSS