Photo By Kien Quan

Where do I begin, this year has been a year plagued with injuries that continue to set me back. First my ankle in March, my neck in June and my upper back and shoulder in August. This limited me in terms of practice and battling. It is a set back however a set back that has taught me how to prepare better when I am traveling and dancing. Aside from that it has been a busy year traveling around the world and doing so many inspiring projects. Going into Freestyle Session weekend I didn’t know where I was at breaking wise. It’s hard when you take breaks from battling because you are always second guessing what your going to do. The more you practice the more natural your moves should feel and this is a big confidence boost when going into battle. On day 1 of FSS the 1 on 1 was looking pretty serious. On a last minute decision I decided to give it a shot, going into the battle I didn’t know what to expect. I ended up passing through to the top 32 and losing in the first round. I’m not sure what happened in that round. I thought I did enough to win my round. In all honesty my head wasn’t in it 100% as well as not being able to warm up properly. So loosing that round left me thinking what mistakes I made. It definitely lit the fire for me to come harder for day 2 of the 3 on 3s.

Photo By Little Shao

Going into day 2 I still felt good physically since I didn’t burn much energy in the 1 on 1. When you battle in a group battle you have to understand where you’re at physically, and mentally. You have to know your position and play it. Knowing when it is your time to go out is a key element to understanding a battle. First you need to understand that you will be loosing some rounds. That is all a part of the strategy, as long you have trust in the guys you are battling with. This is a reason why being confident in what you can do is important. You have to keep your head in the battle. Don’t worry how many screams you get worry about what your going to be dropping next.

Photo By Kien Quan

Every battle was a serious battle, be sure to never over look your opponents. We had the pleasure of battling the likes of so many talented champions, and legends in their own right. As the night started off, I was having bit of trouble thinking of my moves. Having to respond to Kujo’s crazy round pushed me to have to step it up right away. Even if I lost that round to him I definitely enjoyed the energy and level his crew started us off with. As the night went on the I started to find myself in my rounds, which was a relief. Warming up and keeping the blood flowing really made a big difference going into the battles. The 2nd battle was against Beast Coast another heavy hitting crew with some straight raw talent. These guys have been making noise all year long so to go head to head with them was motivating. In this battle I felt my stuff started connecting more. In the top 8 battle we had to battle our own fam and Squadron members. Leaders of The True School, Luigi, Kid David and Keebz. All 3 of them are some of my favorite bboys and also inspire me in different ways. Here, it was all love so it didn’t matter who won. Going into the semi final battle we had to go up against Concrete Docious Effects. These 3 guys we’re killing the battles all night taking out some top level crews. I think they were surprising a lot of people. For me this was real good exchange of rounds. Each guy was coming out and dropping heavy rounds. It really made us step into it and bring our hard stuff as well. At the end of the night we went up against Top 9, one of the illest crews in the world. These guys are all experienced and each guy can take over a battle. So for us it was the same approach taking it one round at a time. It was an evenly matched battle going back and forth, but I think it came down to who had more mistakes. In these moments we can easily get lost. The last round came down to being my turn, the pressure was on and I felt the adrenaline kick in knowing that I had to drop a complete round. I knew what I wanted to do as far as moves but I didn’t know how I was going to pull them off or in what order.

Photo By Kien Quan

In the end we took home the title for the 2nd straight year 2013, 2014 world champions. Personally I want to shout out the whole Squadron fam and also a major, major shout out to El Nino, Viktor and also Nasty Ray for making these back to back wins epic for me. Thank you guys for believing in me!
Freestyle Session has become a pinnacle event and title to claim in our world of breaking. Congrats to Cros and everyone involved in making Freestyle Session happen for all these years. Let’s see what happens next year!

Photo by Emajyn

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