The event, which took place at the Nanjing Hengda Conference and Exhibition Centre, held extra interest as the first World Championship since breakdancing was proposed for provisional inclusion at the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris. 

More than 150 b-boys and b-girls from 66 countries battled it out in front of 12 judges, who scored their performances on six criteria - creativity, personality, technique, variety, performance and musicality.

In the men's contest, b-boys Bumblebee from Russia, and Japan's Shigekix who won gold and bronze, respectively, at the 2018 Summer Youth Olympic Games in Buenos Aires, were eliminated at the quarter-final stage, finishing fifth and seventh respectively.

This left an open field for any of the four semi-finalists, and it was Menno who took advantage, defeating Issei of Japan in the final.

In a tight contest, both men who two of the four rounds, however Menno picked up the highest number of overall votes, 17-11, to be crowned champion.

Menno, who said he was feeling agitated after struggling with jet lag in the early rounds, said: “I feel really happy because I trained really hard for it.

"It’s actually a really big relief because it takes a lot of sacrifice, all the time you put into this, winning it is an amazing feeling for sure.”

Lussy Sky, from Ukraine, completed the podium in third place.

In the women's competition, b-girl Ami put on a hugely impressive final performance to win all four rounds against Sunny of the United States, with Germany's Jilou winning the bronze medal.

Ami said: “I’m so happy because the odds were so big but I still won.

“This was so different from normal breaking jams, I feel like this was real competition so I tried to do many moves and I also tried to dance on a big stage.”

The championship doubled as a qualifying event for the first World Urban Games in Budapest, Hungary this September.

The WDSF said a list of the 12 b-boys and 12 b-girls that qualified will be announced soon.