Olympian Raygun Says She’s Not Fully Retiring from Breakdancing ArticlePure

Olympian Raygun Says She’s Not Fully Retiring from Breakdancing ArticlePure

Paris Olympic competitor Rachael ‘Raygun’ Gunn seemingly announced earlier this month that she was done with her breakdancing career — but now she’s clarifying that she’s not hanging up her breaking shoes quite yet.

The Australian breakdancer, 37, who captured international attention due to her viral Olympics routine that received a 0 score from the judges, recently appeared on Australia’s Today morning show and explained that her previous statement was taken out of context. 

“So I was talking, you know, on 2dayFM about how I’m not going to do certain competitions anymore, which didn’t seem like such a big deal because breaking is not going to be in the Olympics [at the 2028 L.A. Games] anyway,” Raygun said on the show, per the New York Post.

Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

Raygun.

John Walton/PA Images via Getty 


She continued, adding “But you know, I’m still going to be part of community jams, or I’d like to go to community jams and still and still dance and still break — never used the word ‘retire,’ But, you know, it just caught on to the news cycle.”

Raygun further explained that she will never leave the world of breakdancing behind.

“I’m not retiring. You try and stop me. I’m not ever going to stop dancing. So if you hear that again, you know that it’s not the truth. You can’t retire from an art form. So that’s why I’m never going to stop,” she said.

A week earlier, though, Raygun said she’s done with competition after the backlash she received at the Olympics.

“I’m not going to compete anymore, no,” Raygun previously told Australian radio show 2DayFM on Wednesday, Nov. 6, per CNN. “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, you know, that’s like in my living room with my partner,” she said at the time. “It’s been really upsetting. I just didn’t have any control over how people saw me or who I was.”

In August, Raygun spoke about the hate she received following her Olympic performance.

“I didn’t realize that that would also open the door to so much hate which has frankly been pretty devastating,” she said on Instagram at the time. “While, I went out there and I had fun, I did take it very seriously.”

“I worked my butt off, preparing for the Olympics and I gave my all truly,” she continued. “I’m honored to have been a part of the Australian Olympic Team and to be part of breaking’s Olympic debut.”