Rotterdam. Altough the mainstream inustry are abusing breaking as a fashion by using it as a marketing tool, mostly illustrating music without a good beat to breakdance to (better said: just wack music) there’s still a large audience checking for the real art of breaking.

To show there’s quite some breakdancing talent in our little country Mojo organized a b-boy showcase past May. The showcase featured a workshop, the Dutch B-boy Championships 2000 and the Funky Dope Manouvres afterparty.

The Championships were the first held since 1989, but for a couple of years on the downlow, the scene wasn’t big enough. The hosts for the night were MC Alee (Rotterdam) and Tyrone from Mojo. The judging-comittee consisted of represenatatives of several B-boy crews like the Starforce Crew, Turn It Loose Crew, the 010 B-Boyz and the Got Skillz Crew. They had the hard job of choosing a winner.

The battles for the Championships had been subdivised on age, the winner from the age group 10-14 years was the crew from Enschede which defeated the B-boys from Apeldoorn in the finals. There were quite some more good breakers hanging around but they weren’t old enough to participate in the battles. Say what ?! In between the battles the floor was cleared, as usual, with these events, so everyone could show what they were capable of. And these young cats gave it their best shot, being applauded by the bystanders and fellow-breakers, sometimes even getting some personal advise from the veterans like Paulo from the 010 BBoyz, one the best known crew in our country.

In the next two-on-two battle for the 15-17 year Championships, it was a homefield advantage for both teams, as Delano and Adilson came out as the final winners.

As the show continued there were shows by Rotterdams Lef, a crew doing something of both spoken word and dance and the International Girls, a R&B/Ragga Streetdance group, also the audience was getting served some pretty dope perfomances by B-boy crews like Rocking Nation from Enschede, Illusionary Rockers from Nieuwegein, Got Skillz Crew from Rotterdam, One Step Ahead from Amsterdam, Star Force from Rotterdam and Perfect Combination from Apeldoorn, with DJ’s Raprazent, Cut Nice, Mista Sweet and DEF providing the beats.

The final battle for best group went up between the crews Got Skillz and Illusionary Rockers, altough they both did pretty good, Got Skillz had the final cut over the Illusionary Rockers. Seeing all these young B-boys and B-girls doing their thing, some of the veterans in attendance got their time to break in the Super Exhibition Battle with Paulo, Mario, Carlos (010 Bboyz), Michael (Freezone), Noah, Clifton (Starforce), Crok, Kim (Berlin), Mambo (Brussels) and two other breakers from the Munster All-Stars.

All together, it was a good night, and for those who still have had enough, there even was the Funky Dope Manouvres Afterparty with DJ Cutnice on the Wheels of Steel and MC’s Onno, Mr. Ballantine and Shek live onstage.

And well…. for those of you who’ve missed out or still want more; you’ll have to wait untill next year when the 2001 Champioships will take place somewhere in April…


Loot