the break is foundational to hip hop.

The third annual Capital City Breaking Jam is underway.

Cross-steps, headstands and a little friendly taunting have the crowd here at Lansing shuffle transfixed, as 13 youth breakers compete for a cash prize of 300 bucks in the championship, B-Girl Lightning edges out B-Boy Jonas for the dub.

These young breakers aren't just showing off their moves.

They're carrying on the legacy of what has become a global phenomenon.

break is referring to a portion of the record that is isolated for the drums It was the go off moment at the parties where peopl were like, Oh, that's the part we were waiting for that, that funky drummer break.

You're getting a history lesson by participating, Because now you're adopting this identity of B-Boy or B-Girl.

What's that B mean?

Break.

What is break?

Break is this.

Oh, there's a whole history.

There's a thread that connects The seventies, the Bronx, Ne York, where Breaking was born.

During this time, it could be seen regularly at block parties, clubs and public spaces.

Originating as a street dance style, primarily among black and brown youth, it combines elements of dance, martial arts and even gymnastics.

And now it has something in common with gymnastics being recognized as an Olympic sport.

For the first time this year in Paris.

B-Boy Glyde has his entire left arm tattooed in dedication to breaking - I got Wavy Legs over here, Kid Glyde... Who served as one of the judges in this year's jam.

top rock, get down, spin around Hailing from Queens, New York, Glide is one of the founding members of the famed breaking crew: the Dynamic Rockers.

I was the Michael Jordan of breaking, and I still am.

And he isn't shy in letting you know that he' one of the best to ever do it.

Glyde says he foresaw breaking making it to the Olympic stage years ago.

want you to touch upon how this thing is blowing up, breaking, being on a national stage like this, Did you ever think it would get here?

Yeah, I immediately thought when I was like 17 years old that we were going to be in the Olympics.

You knew so you saw this moment come.

I thought we were going to have characters and everything.

Little like wrestling guys.

And although the art form can be flashy, good breakin comes down to the fundamentals.

I look at some of these videos and it just blows my mind, Glyde.

Okay.

And you know what?

Some of those guys are really crazy awesome, but they're missing the foundation.

if you're not doing your footwork, if you're not going in somebody's face, if you're not at the end of it getting out of the circle the right way then you're missing something.

It's those fundamentals.

Yeah.

It's crazy what they're doing but, you're missing something.

The Olympic competition saw 16 B-Boys and 17 B-Girls compete in 1v1 battles.

But the event dre mixed reactions from the public, mostly due to the performance of Australian breaker Rachael Gunn and her less than stellar showing.

One, it was monumental, right?

It was a moment of like while I was watchin in my living room with my boys.

It was some emotional moments, right, where I'm like, wow, I can't believe this is happening.

Like, this is part of my culture.

Like, I understand this, you know, I'm saying.

So there was a genuine excitement but there was a moment there where, you know, somebody came in and they were running last place.

You know, I didn't think nothing of it.

I want to go and address that elephant in the room.

Yeah, Yeah.

Rachel Gunn A.K.A.

B-Girl Raygun, Yeah, she went viral.

her performance became a bookmark.

Moment of the Olympics.

I think the thing that was hard for people to wrestle with was, in our own community, we're talking about the difference of the dance and the sport, there's an art to understanding the body mechanic that does validate it as a sport what we saw was somebody leaning more into the dance component and the expression of her artistry on a stage where people are expecting to see top tier athleticism.

99.9% of the contestants on that stage delivered that.

In July, the All of the Above Hip Hop Academy, which has operated for years... officially cut the ribbon on its first public facing headquarters in downtown Lansing.

Ozay Moore, an accomplished emcee and DJ who pioneered the Cap City Jam, the founder and executive director of the academy.

He took me through the space during the opening when it was still under construction.

What does this mean to you, man?

Seeing this knowing that this place is open, It's been 12 years in the making.

What does this mean to you?

I mean, to be real I've neve even been to a ribbon cutting.

Really?

So you know the significance of it.

It kind of dawned on me while I was sitting here I was like, it's the community.

it's 12 years of building and building trust.

So I don't know where it's gonna go.

You gotta put it somewhere special, right?

Yeah we gotta put it somewhere special.

That was then...

This is now.

The academy acting as a training ground for young men and women in the arts of graffiti, emceeing, DJ-ing, and you guessed it, breaking.

But the training goes well beyond the arts.

we pose the possibilities of pathways for young people that isn't self-sabotaging.

And we have those conversation at the same time not condemning what they're, you know what they might be experiencing.

Now we just shift the conversation What would it look like if you had a bunch of people around you supporting you, giving you good advice, at the same time teaching you how to do what you're interested in.

That's the connecting piece You wanna learn how to rhyme?.

I know how to rhyme.

I can teach you how to do it better.

And you can probably teach me how to do it better, right?

This exchange, that mentorship.

But what if we shifted the conversations?

Like, say, what would you want to do with your life man, Let's figure that out.

Anthony Jones is a former pupil of Moore's who came through the Academy's program as an Emcee.

The student is now the teacher.

He excelled at AOTA.

The program had such a profound impact on him that Moore has brought Jones on to teach and mentor the next crop of young hip hop talent.

throughout all of the all of the things that I've done with AOTA and outside of AOTA, he' been right there in my corner.

I mean he's my O.G.

Like I feel like every person has an O.G.

and and I feel like he's mine at this point.

Like he's, he's been massively instrumental in pretty much everything that I've accomplished I've been perusing your albums left and right, man, there's one track tha really stood out to me, ... hard to stay positive when I haven't got that right break yet.

They talking but it seems it' coming out the side they neck.

along with these high priced stakes that if I want, I risk watching another shorty... Why is touching young lives through the vehicle of hip hop so important to you?

it's life, you know, I'm saying, like, we're all we're all living this thing and we don't we don't really get the say so on what we come into.

And this might not be everybody's thing, you know, it might not be everybody's like passion or purpose in life to give of what they have.

So that somebody else has.

but for whatever reason, that's just what drives me.

That's like my that's my that is my true north.

I just do my own little part.