Raygun: How did B-Girl Rachael Gunn make it to the Olympics?

When breaker Rachael Gunn – aka Raygun – bombed out of the Paris Olympics, the shockwaves hit a tiny hip-hop scene on the opposite aspect of the world.

In a Sydney warehouse-turned-community centre, breakers heat up with ab workouts that may make a Pilates trainer cry, earlier than taking to the ground with acrobatic strikes so intricate you possibly can barely make them out.

It is without doubt one of the most vital occasions of the yr – a qualifier for the Crimson Bull BC One World Finals – and the previous week weighs heavy.

A couple of individuals nervously look on the handful of cameras lining the dance circle, their minds little question flashing to pictures of Gunn which have set the web alight.

“I really feel prefer it’s simply pushed our scene in Australia into the Darkish Ages,” Australian hip-hop pioneer Spice instructed the BBC.

Gunn, a 36-year-old college lecturer, misplaced all three of her Olympic battles in viral vogue, her green and gold tracksuit and unorthodox routine – which included the sprinkler and kangaroo-inspired hopping – producing waves of memes and abuse.

The fallout has divided and dissatisfied the Australian breaking group.

“It made a mockery of the Australian scene and I believe that is why a whole lot of us are hurting,” Spice says.

Many have rushed to defend Raygun towards the onslaught.

Others are able to admit there are inquiries to be answered over her qualification and efficiency, however say the worldwide bullying has undermined any try to pretty analyse what went down in Paris.

Gunn has at all times been a dancer – albeit in jazz, faucet and ballroom first – nevertheless it was her husband and coach Samuel Free that launched her to the world of breaking when she was 20.

She says it took years for her to search out her place within the male-dominated scene.

“There have been occasions that I’d go into the lavatory crying as a result of I used to be so embarrassed at how horrible I used to be at this,” she instructed The Guardian Australia forward of the Olympics.

Ultimately although, Gunn grew to become the face of breaking in Australia – a top-ranked b-girl and an instructional with a PhD within the cultural politics of the game.

And at an Olympics qualifying occasion in Sydney final October, the place 15 girls from throughout Oceania competed, Raygun emerged triumphant and formally booked her ticket to Paris.

Like Gunn, breaking was maybe a stunning candidate for the Olympics. Born within the cultural melting pot that was the Bronx within the Seventies, the road dance rapidly grew to become a world phenomenon.

And lately – alongside city sports activities like skateboarding and BMX freestyle – it caught the attention of Olympics chiefs determined to draw new and youthful audiences.

Some argued it didn’t deserve Olympic consideration, whereas others insisted a contest like that might not seize breaking’s essence and would solely additional divorce the artform from the road tradition it got here from.

All eyes have been on the occasion in Paris to see if the Olympic Committee’s gamble would repay.

From the second the ultimate b-girl battle on the Olympics wrapped up, it was clear that breaking had certainly captured world consideration – or, extra particularly, Raygun had.

Rumours and criticism of her efficiency unfold like wildlife, significantly on-line. Gunn acquired a torrent of violent messages.

An nameless petition demanding Gunn apologise was signed by 50,000 individuals.

She was accused – with out proof – of manipulating her approach onto the world’s largest stage on the expense of different up-and-coming expertise within the Australian hip-hop scene.

Some individuals shared a conspiracy that she had created the governing physique which ran the Oceania qualifiers, and a lie that her husband – who can also be a distinguished member of the breaking group and a professional choose – was on the panel that chosen her.

Australian factchecking organisations and AUSBreaking, the nationwide organisation for breaking, rapidly tried to right the document, however that didn’t cease the flood.

Then there have been these arguing that she had mocked hip-hop tradition.

In a sequence of statements, AUSBreaking confused that judges have been “educated to uphold the very best requirements of impartiality” and that not a single individual on the nine-person panel for the Oceania qualifiers was Australian.

And whereas AUSBreaking has had many “interactions” with Raygun since its conception in 2019, at no level had she ever held a management place or been concerned in “any resolution making over occasions, funding, technique, choose choice or athlete choice”.

Taking to Instagram to garbage all of the “crackpot theories”, Te Hiiritanga Wepiha – a Kiwi choose on the Oceania qualifying panel – stated Raygun received honest and sq..

“All us judges talked about how she was going to get smashed, completely smashed [at the Olympics]… She knew it was going to be tough, so it is really brave of her,” Wepiha – also called Rush – stated in a livestream

A number of the nation’s most embellished athletes and highest Olympic officers additionally loudly defended Gunn.

“The petition has stirred up public hatred with none factual foundation. It is appalling,” the Australian Olympic Committee’s Matt Carroll stated in a press release.

Gunn herself had beforehand stated she was “by no means” going to have the ability to beat her highly effective opponents, so had “needed to maneuver in a different way, be creative and inventive”.

In a video posted to social media within the eye of the general public storm, Gunn added that she had taken the competitors “very significantly”.

“I labored my butt off getting ready for the Olympics and I gave my all. Really.”

She had solely been making an attempt to “deliver pleasure”, she stated. “I did not understand that that may additionally open the door to a lot hate, which has frankly been fairly devastating.”

Some throughout the Australian hip-hop group admit the response to Raygun’s routine initially elicited “a chuckle” – nevertheless it rapidly obtained out of hand.

Everybody was unequivocal in condemning the sheer quantity of abuse, ridicule and misinformation that has focused Raygun and the broader Australian b-girl group.

However past that, feeling is considerably cut up.

Many b-girls say Raygun’s efficiency doesn’t replicate the usual in Australia.

“Once I first noticed it, I used to be so embarrassed,” Spice – who retired from breaking years in the past – says.

On every other stage, Raygun would have been inspired and supported for “having a go”, Spice says, however individuals representing the nation must be at a sure stage.

“It’s the Olympics for God’s sake!”

“In hip-hop we’ve got this factor, you step up otherwise you step off… That you must know your house.”

She stresses, although, that the “bullying is simply disgusting”.

B-girl’s movies are being trolled, their DMs inundated with insults and violent threats. Younger dancers are being harassed in school, and lots of now really feel unsafe practising in public.

“The impression this controversy has had on the native Australian women has been devastating… [we’re] allowed to be offended,” b-girl Tinylocks instructed the BBC.

She, like some others the BBC spoke to, stated they didn’t need their full names publish as a result of the size of abuse circulating.

Tinylocks – who herself has battled Raygun – thinks Gunn merely had a horrible day, and questions her routine selections.

“We all know you are able to extra… Had been you arrange for achievement?”

In keeping with Wepiha, the Oceania panel choose also called Rush, Gunn’s victory in qualifying displays the dimensions of the “tiny” breaking scene in Australia, and the even tinier public and authorities help for it.

“I imply, we needed to really get individuals out of retirement to make up the numbers,” Rush stated.

“That is how small the scene is.”

Others says there have been guidelines which can have made a small expertise pool even shallower – just like the requirement that potential qualifiers be a member of AUSBreaking and that they’ve a legitimate passport, in step with guidelines put ahead by the World Dance Sport Federation.

AUSBreaking didn’t reply to the BBC’s queries about Raygun’s choice, the monetary help it receives or the way it seeks out the nation’s greatest breaking expertise.

However Steve Gow, the group’s secretary and long-time b-boy Stevie G, tells the BBC the dimensions and isolation of Australia inhibits the expansion and improvement of the scene.

Being so distant from different, larger hip-hop communities overseas could make it exhausting – each when it comes to the money and time required – to be taught from them.

“It may be very insular,” he says.

As if proving the purpose, he usually pauses to greet virtually everybody who walks into the Crimson Bull competitors, which he’s judging.

He insists there’s nonetheless a top quality of breaking in Australia.

Finally, the group is bitterly harm by the world’s response.

They really feel breaking isn’t actually understood, and that folks have piled on with out information or context.

“It’s a giant disappointment as a result of they’re not speaking concerning the winners… they’re all speaking about Raygun’s memes, they usually’re not even seeing her full set,” Samson Smith – a member of hip hop group Justice Crew and a breaker for over 20 years – instructed Community 10.

However many hope a silver lining might but emerge.

“She may really deliver sufficient consideration to get sources,” Rush stated.

“On the finish of the day, Australia has essentially the most well-known Olympian of 2024 and he or she may really save the scene right here.”