After dedicating nearly every waking second to the pursuit of perfection in your chosen field, it is difficult to imagine a worse outcome than having your moment on the world stage overshadowed by a minor costume failure that led to you flashing a nip. Unfortunately, this is exactly what happened to French ice dancer Gabriella Papadakis.
Papadakis was right in the midst of a stunning routine with partner Guillaume Cizeron at the Winter Olympics when part of her dress became unfastened, with one particularly energetic motion dislodging the dress’ top enough to reveal a nipple.
Papadakis said that she felt the top give way, but knew that they would be docked points for stopping the routine to fix it, so carried on like an absolute champ. She was visibly upset in the immediate wake of the routine but told reporters later that she was proud of how they continued under the circumstances:
It was pretty distracting, kind of my worst nightmare happening at the Olympics. I told myself, ‘I don’t have a choice. I have to keep going,’ and that’s what we did. I think we can be proud of ourselves being able to deliver a great performance with that happening.
The pair still managed to come in at second place with 81.93 points, although Papadakis seems to believe their score may have suffered because of the issue:
It’s a little bit frustrating to know that it’s not because of something that we did. It’s just a costume issue, something as stupid as that, so it’s a little bit disappointing.
The rules state that a point can be docked for the loss of any part of the costume.
Having come third place in the 100m freestyle at my Year 5 swimming carnival because my speedos came off when I dove into the pool, I can 100% sympathise.
