This year at the Paris 2024 Olympics Breaking or what is known more in the common parlance as breakdancing has made its debut.
The debut breakdancing event featured 17 B-girls and 16 B-boys who had landed in Paris in the hope of winning the inaugural gold medal for the event.
However, what caught the eyes of viewers from across the globe was not the sport itself but the performance of one of the athletes.
Rachael Gunn, an Australian breaker who competes under the name “Raygun” enamoured her viewers despite being a long way away from standing on the winning podium.
The imagination of the international audience was drawn more by her background and age than her performance.
Raygun was trailing 0-3 in her head-to-head competitions Friday trailing behind Logistx of the United States, Syssy of France and eventual silver medalist Nicka of Lithuania by a combined score of 54-0. However, she enamoured the fans and won them over with her demeanour despite not recording a single point in three matches.
Rachael Gunn’s short-lived detour at the Olympics was not very rewarding by the way of winning a medal but she became an instant celebrity and her fans grew manifold when they learned more about her and the Break-Dance Olympics Video.
Rachael Gunn who is 36 years old is the oldest qualifier in the breaking event. She has a PhD in cultural studies under her belt and is a college professor at Macquarie University in Sydney. Her research is focused on breaking, street dance and hip-hop culture her work also involves ethnography, cultural theory, media, popular music studies, and dance studies,
Gunn was talking to CNBC and said,
“In 2023, many of my students didn’t believe me when I told them I was training to qualify for the Olympics, and were shocked when they checked Google and saw that I qualified,”
Unlike her other athletic counterparts, Gunn took up breakdancing much later in life and she entered her first professional championship in 2012.
Australian Olympian Rachael Gunn is an exception to the adage by George Bernard Shaw,
“Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach.”
Gunn not only teaches but also competes and won innumerable fans.
Her performance has won admiration and fans have taken to social media to express their feelings.
Here’s some of the reaction to Rachael Gunn and her performance:
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