Raygun says she's done with competitive breaking after viral Olympic fame

Raygun says she’s done with competitive breaking after viral Olympic fame

Posted by Admin November 7, 2024 Sports

Raygun will limit her breakdancing to the living room going forward. (Photo by Elsa/Getty Images)

Rachael “Raygun” Gunn is moving on from competitive breakdancing, a few months after becoming the sport’s viral star at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

The 37-year-old was reflecting on her experience during an interview on 2DayFM’s “Jimmy & Nath Show” in Australia when she revealed she was done breaking competitively, though she’ll continue to do it in her personal life:

“I still break, but I don’t compete. I’m not going to compete anymore, no … I was going to keep competing, for sure, but that seems really difficult for me to do now to approach a battle. Yeah, I mean I still dance and I still break, but that’s like in my living room with my partner.”

Gunn received international derision in August when social media got a hold of her breaking routine, which featured a number of moves that could be described as unorthodox, at best. Gunn didn’t score a point in her three matches of the opening round, but left with her head held high.

Controversy followed, with some observers fixating on Gunn’s life and career to a degree that led to her publicly requesting that her family be left alone. The Australian Olympic Committee stood by her after a petition requested an investigation into how she made the Olympic team, and another one demanding she apologize.

Gunn complained about the conspiracy theorists again Wednesday:

“It’s surreal and it’s still impossible to process. The conspiracy theories were totally wild and it was really upsetting because I felt like I didn’t have any control over how people saw me or who I was, who my partner was, my story. So it was really upsetting for a number of different reasons. People still don’t listen and people still don’t read.”

In an odd twist, Gunn was named the No. 1 female breaker after the Olympics due to better results in other competitions (she is ranked No. 17 as of Wednesday). The sport was also dropped from the Olympic program in Los Angeles for 2028, to the surprise of few.

A major reason for Gunn to stop competing was the amount of eyeballs she faced if she ever stepped into the arena again:

“I think the level of scrutiny that’s going to be there and people will be filming it and it will go online. It’s just not going to mean the same thing, it’s not going to be the same experience because of everything that’s at stake.”

So Gunn will leave the Olympics as her final official dance. For the future, she hinted at “some projects happening behind the scenes,” mostly focusing on encouraging positivity and pushing people to “be their authentic selves.” She also recently revealed a makeover on the cover of Australia’s “Stellar” magazine.

In the meantime, she still has her job as a lecturer at the Macquarie University Faculty of Arts.