Editor’s note: This story and headline were updated to reflect Pritchard is on the U.S. national team and is still attempting to qualify for the 2024 Games.

One year out until the 2024 Paris Olympics begin and Staff Sgt. Brianna Pritchard is preparing to hopefully serve some serious moves on the dance floor next summer.

“I get to represent the United States as both an athlete and a soldier. Not sure how it gets any better than that,” she told 12News KPNX.

The Army National Guard member born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska, is on the first-ever U.S. national team for breaking, the competitive sport commonly known as break dancing, which is making its debut at the upcoming international sporting event. She will attempt to qualify for the Olympic Games this fall, according to Kristen Gowdy, a spokesperson from Team USA.

The highly anticipated Paris Games, scheduled for July 26 to August 11, offers athletes from around the world the chance to showcase their incredible talents — even with less familiar sports like breaking. But, excitement for the competition comes as debate over participation of Russian athletes at the Games heats up amid the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Staff Sgt. Brianna Pritchard shows her Olympic breaking moves. (Courtesy photo by Devin Hong)

So what is breaking? How will it be scored? Let’s ‘break’ it down.

Breaking is a dance style, first featured at an Olympic event in 2018, characterized by a combination of athletic maneuvers including spins, flips and other complex body movements. Other sports that have also recently premiered on the Olympic stage include sport climbing, skateboarding, surfing, BMX freestyle and 3x3 basketball.

The b-boys and b-girls, as the breaking competitors are known, will be judged on their performance using various criteria like originality, technique and execution.

The breaking events are currently slated to occur at La Concorde in Paris from August 9-10, 2024.

Pritchard — nicknamed “Snap 1″ — serves with the Arizona Army National Guard, 12News KPNX reported, though she also served with the Alaska Army National Guard, according to an Army release.

She has worked as a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter mechanic and technical inspector, as the only female flight instructor in the Alaska National Guard and as an honor graduate for the flight instructor course, the release added.

In 2021, her Army National Guard unit was attached to the California Army National Guard’s 40th Combat Aviation Brigade and activated to deploy to the Middle East, according to the release.

“If you dedicate yourself with enough discipline, you can serve your country, be an outstanding soldier, and achieve your dreams,” she said in the release.

Military Times did not immediately hear back to requests for comment from Pritchard.

Jonathan is a staff writer and editor of the Early Bird Brief newsletter for Military Times. Follow him on Twitter @lehrfeld_media

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