One of the world’s oldest competitive “breakers,” or breakdancers, is twisting and shouting Bitcoin (BTC) on dancefloors across the United States. Aged 64, Ben Hart told Cointelegraph he reckons he’s “the world’s oldest actively competing breaker.”
For context, Gary Gensler, the chair of the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC, is the same age. But it’s unlikely Gensler will be shredding up the dancefloor wearing Bitcoin jerseys any time soon:
Hart took up breakdancing in 2011, amazed by the “athleticism” of the hip hop street dance. He recruited an expert to learn the ropes and spent years honing his skills by incorporating flips, power moves and freezes.
He took a similar approach to Bitcoin, which he first learned in 2014. He spent hundreds of hours studying the tech before buying his first Bitcoin in 2019. Hart took Gary Gensler’s MIT Course on Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies and read the Bitcoin white paper “at least ten times.” Plus, rather than going all in, Hart began by dollar-cost averaging into what he considers “the only truly decentralized cryptocurrency or asset out there.”
As a result, when the price crashed at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020—and many sold—Hart bought more. His thorough education crystallized into a resolute conviction about the currency’s future.
Furthermore, Hart explains “When the Fed launched its manic money printing in 2020 to start handing out free money to people (even way more money printing than usual), I thought this was the exact situation Bitcoin was designed for.”
“Bitcoin’s mission is to be honest money. So I started buying a lot more Bitcoin.”
Hart was hooked. So much so that he began wearing Bitcoin jerseys to breakdancing competitions and evangelized Bitcoin to his entourage, while steering them clear of trading and altcoins.
“I basically think trading is a losers game. […] My advice to them is to take 10% of whatever they have to invest and buy Bitcoin. That’s what I tell my kids to do.”
Hart told Cointelegraph that he tells his younger breaker peers to stop trading and “forget about the other cryptos for now.”
Hart’s been spotted on dancefloors on TV shows such as Good Morning America, while he’s already two-stepped his way into the Bitcoin community. Cory Kliippsten, CEO of Swan Bitcoin, appears to have extended an invitation Hart’s way for Bitcoin conference Pacific Bitcoin in November this year.
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Hart and his wife have six kids and split their time between Miami and Chicago. Besides breaking, he is now dedicating his time to Bitcoin education. He joins a growing list of Bitcoin Boomers—HODLers born between 1946 and 1964—while his first Bitcoin book is soon to be published.