The B-girl known as Raygun has apologized to Australia’s breakdancing community for the negative reactions that followed her viral performance while representing the country at the Paris Olympics last month.
In the same interview, however, Rachael Gunn defended her qualifications to compete during breakdancing’s debut as an Olympic sport and stood by a widely mocked routine that included an imitation of a kangaroo among other unconventional moves.
“I am very sorry for the backlash that the community has experienced, but I can’t control how people react,” Gunn, a Sydney university professor who turned 37 on Monday, told Waleed Aly on an episode of the Australian talk show “The Project” that aired Wednesday.
“Unfortunately, we just need some more resources in Australia for us to have a chance to be world champions. Historically, we haven’t had the best track record of winning world championships, so I don’t think that’s just on me.”
In August, a change.org petition called for an investigation into the selection process that allowed Gunn into the competition. It received more than 57,000 signatures, but the website took the petition down after it “was flagged for misinformation and was reviewed according to our Community Guidelines,” the site said in a statement.
“The conspiracy theories were just awful,” Gunn told Aly. “That was upsetting, because it wasn’t just people that didn’t understand breaking and were just angry about my performance. It was people that are now attacking our reputation and our integrity. And none of them were grounded in any kind of facts.”
Asked how she qualified for the Paris Games, Gunn paused before stating matter-of-factly, “I won the Oceania championships,” referring to the qualifying competition held last fall in Sydney.
“As simple as that?” Aly said.
“It was a direct qualifier,” Gunn laughed in response. “Yeah.”
Aly then asked Gunn if she had any prior relationships with any of the judges at the qualifier.
“There were nine judges, all from overseas,” Gunn said. “I don’t think any of them have judged anything that I’ve been in before.”
Gunn said she did her best to shield herself from the negative reactions by taking a break from social media and the internet in general.
“It was really sad how much hate that it did evoke,” Gunn said. “And a lot of the response, though, is also just due to people not being very familiar with breaking and the diversity of approaches in breaking. … The energy and vitriol that people had was pretty alarming.”
Aly asked Gunn if she believes she is Australia’s best female breakdancer.
“Well, I think my record speaks to that,” Gunn said. “I was the top-ranked Australian B girl in 2020 and 2022, and 2023. I’ve been invited to represent at how many world championships — Paris, Korea. You know, so the record is there, but anything can happen in a battle.”
Gunn said she still hasn’t watched her Olympic performance. Nor has she seen the skit on “The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon” poking fun at her. But, Gunn said, she does plan to view both of them eventually.
“I am still in the process of being able to describe how I feel about all this stuff,” she said, “because it kind of feels like a really weird dream that I’ve been having, that I’m gonna wake up from at any moment.”