Break dancers are getting weird lumps from 'extensive headspinning' — but NYC pioneers say newbies are just doing it wrong
Raygun’s year just got even worse.
Doctors are warning break dancers to avoid head spinning after performers developed cone-like lumps on their noggins — with one B-boy even having to get it surgically removed, according to a new medical journal report.
The deformed dancer grew the bulbous mound of tissue — dubbed a “break dance bulge” — due to years of friction between his scalp and the ground, according to a study published in the British Medical Journal Thursday.
The unnamed dancer, who was in his 30s and did five head spins a week, underwent a successful surgery to remove the benign mass from between his skull and skin, the report said. Surgeons also shaved off a thickened portion of his head.
“Despite ‘headspin hole’ being known within the break dancing community, it is scarcely documented in the medical literature,” doctors wrote in the report, noting the condition is also linked to hair loss and “tenderness.”
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But Bronx breaking pioneer Tony “Mr. Wave” Wesley told The Post the problem was fixed long ago with the right protective gear and “technique.”
“Some of my crew realized they were burning their hair away, so we went to padded hats and bike helmets — and that was in the 80s,” Wesley said.
The bizarre bumps are likely linked to the “wrong mechanics of going down on the floor” with too much force, he said.
“It’s the pounding, not the spinning,” he said. “It’s no different than lifting weights: If you don’t have proper technique, you’re going to hurt yourself.”
He said breakers should lower themselves onto the ground in a slower, handstand-style instead of diving dome-first.
Many newbies, however, don’t know the safer style because they’re “learning from the internet” instead of “veterans” on the street, he said.
“Now these kids go straight into the power moves. It’s riskier what they do today,” he said. “It’s as safe as you want it to be.”
Still, breakers aren’t likely to quit busting the move anytime soon, he said.
“It’s foolish to say stop it,” he said of head-spinning. “It will never stop.”
In the medical study, the patient said he’d been doing headpins for 19 years and that lump had grown bigger and more painful over the past five years.
He reported training about five times a week for 1.5 hours with up to seven minutes dedicated to head-spinning during each session.
“I have received a lot of positive feedback and people say it looks well done, that I have a nice scar,” the patient said in a statement included in the case report. “Many say that they no longer notice that I have a bump and that my head looks completely normal.”
In August, the Australian breaker Raygun caught the Internet’s wrath for her embarrassing lack of skills — including head spinning — at the 2024 Paris Olympics, where she scored zero points.