Equally striking and a love for combat sports runs in Rivera’s blood, the son of a break-dancer thinks he may have been secretly born with the gift of dancing. It only took the help of a 21% Tomato-rated movie to discover her love for dancing, and the rest is Rivera twins history.
“Out of nowhere my brother and I watched this movie Intensify, this break dance movie, and we loved it,” Rivera said. “Since then, when we were young, we were battle dancing all the time. We just got to the point where we got really good. We didn’t train it or anything, we just got really, really good. I think I was born with it, to be honest.
Rivera’s mastery of a skill that historically hasn’t been closely tied to wrestling means his teammates, fans, opponents and others might be slow to appreciate his skills. Thanks to her contagious positivity and entertaining personality, it doesn’t take long for them to show up.
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“There are people who are going to say, ‘Yo, knock it off,'” Rivera explained. “You have that, but then there are the people who go with it and hype things up and stuff. I feel like it depends on the person.”
The small number of wrestlers-turned-dancers in the sport means Rivera thinks he’s easily the best break-dancer in the entire NCAA.
Along with etching his name in NCAA glory, Rivera also looks forward to the day when he can not only leave a legacy in wrestling, but make a name for himself and his brother in breakdancing, venturing into MMA and, most importantly, forget Head Coach Scotti Sentes’ attempt to match Rivera’s dance moves.
“Feel, oh man. I saw him dance once and had to say a quick prayer after that,” Rivera said. “I was like, I don’t know what I just witnessed. ‘Bad’ doesn’t even do that. It was horrible. I thought about transferring the next day.
Will Rivera hit a Dougie after a strong showing at Battle At Bragg? You’ll need to sign up for UFC FIGHT PASS to find out.
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