In the early 1990s, Victor Montalvo's parents decided to leave Mexico and crossed the Chihuahua desert in search of a better life.
“They basically had to drive through the desert and then get in a car with some unknown guy in Texas. And from there, they drove to Florida,” Montalvo told Fox News Digital of her parents' journey to the U.S. “My dad told me that he already had a brother who was in Florida. And they were like, 'Hey, you guys should come here. It's a better life.'”
It was an existential decision that led Montalvo to win bronze for the United States at the Paris Olympics in breakdancing, which was potentially the only time the sport will be featured in the Olympics.
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Bronze medalist Victor Montalvo of Team USA walks to the podium during the Breaking B-Boys medal ceremony at the Paris Olympics on August 10, 2024. (Steph Chambers/Getty Images)
For Montalvo, representing the United States was an easy decision inspired by one his parents made many decades ago.
Montalvo said his parents first worked long hours on a farm in Florida picking oranges and strawberries, before his father got a job at the Rainforest Café at Disneyland. Montalvo is the middle of three children whom his parents had to support. But that didn't stop them from introducing Victor to breakdancing when he was just 6 years old, when they arrived in the country where the sport originated.
“I could have represented Mexico, but honestly, I feel like I'm taking someone's place, you know? And I wasn't born in Mexico, my family was born in Mexico, I was born in the United States. So, for me, the best thing was to represent where I was born and where I'm from,” Montalvo said.
But just as that destiny began when her parents climbed into the backseat of a car headed for Florida, nearly all of it unraveled while Montalvo was in the backseat of a car driving through Los Angeles on her birthday, May 1, just three months before Paris.
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He was in the backseat of a car driven by his friend, while his friend's girlfriend sat in the passenger seat. They all nearly lost their lives when another car ran a red light and crashed into Montalvo and his two friends.
Montalvo said he was not wearing a seat belt.
Victor Montalvo performs in the men's breakdancing final at the World Urban Games in Budapest, Hungary, on September 14, 2019. (ATTILA KISBENEDEK/AFP via Getty Images)
“I had severe whiplash and I didn't know if I was going to be able to compete. I thought I had broken my neck,” Montalvo said. “My friend had a small shoulder injury, I had very severe whiplash, I couldn't move my neck. I thought I had broken it for a month.”
Montalvo had to undergo a month of physical therapy, interrupting his usual training, to regain full control of his neck. Although he was initially unsure of his ability to recover, he regained his form.
Then, just as he was finishing physiotherapy for the accident, he suffered a shoulder injury during training, from which he had to recover less than two months before Paris.
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“Man, why is all this happening right before the Olympics, right before my event?” he said to himself at the time.
But she persevered through physical therapy for her shoulder and managed to return to the court for a chance to win a historic medal.
And at 30, the veteran break player won his Olympic title when he defeated Japan's Shigeyuki Nakarai in the bronze medal match, 3-0, on the penultimate day of the Paris Olympics.
Victor Montalvo, aka B-Boy Victor, of Team USA, hugs Hiroto Ono, aka B-Boy Hiro10, of Team Japan during the Breaking B-Boys Round Robin Group A battle at the Paris Olympics on August 10, 2024. (Elsa/Getty Images)
This week, he returned home to a hero's welcome. On Wednesday, he kept the medal close in his pocket as he gave a series of media interviews. He keeps it close, knowing it could be the only Olympic medal the United States ever wins in his sport.
Who knows how much the medal will be worth one day if there is never breakdancing at the Olympics again?
But Montalvo, at 30, knows Paris may have been her only chance to compete in the Olympics as a “breaker.” She knows the sport won’t be returning at the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics, even though her sport originated in the U.S. But its future as an Olympic sport at the 2032 Games in Brisbane, Australia, and beyond is unclear.
“We don't really know if breaking will ever be back in the Olympics,” he said. “For me to have a medal and say I made history, I made history for breaking culture, it means a lot to me to be the first American breaking medalist.”
Victor Montalvo, known as B-Boy Victor, of Team USA competes at the Paris Olympics on August 10, 2024. (Shen Bohan/Xinhua via Getty Images)
The breaking tournament received mixed reviews from Olympic viewers online. Criticism was harshly directed at Australian athlete Raygun, who received zero points in the competition and went viral for his questionable moves.
But for Montalvo, Raygun's viral routine has actually been successful for his personal brand, and he believes it has even grown the sport as a whole.
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“I went to the comments on my battles and people below were like, 'Wow! I came to see Breaking for Raygun, and now I'm really into it. This is really awesome, you know?'” Montalvo said. “So, it's like we'd been getting a lot of negative reviews, but now there's a lot of people tuning in to the event, watching it, and then really enjoying it.
“They went to see if the breakup was that serious and they just tuned in.”
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