More than a year and a half after starting a break in her career, Gabriella Papadakis gave a long interview to FranceInfo on the occasion of the World Figure Skating Championships (March 18-24) in Canada, in which the Olympic champion and her sporting partner, Guillaume Cizeron, therefore did not participate.
During the two months following the announcement of her break in the summer of 2022, the 28-year-old skater did not take the ice once. “It was the first time in my life… And it was great! she confided. This break allowed me to take a little distance, to step back, just in a healthy way, to individualize myself more and think about myself. »
This long break, the end of which has not yet been fixed, above all allowed Gabriella Papadakis to question the world of figure skating and the climate of violence in which she grew up as a skater.
“The problem is that we authorize, accept and normalize a lot of violence. And we think that the results will just erase them or cancel them, or allow us to forgive everything. I sincerely believe that this violence is absolutely not necessary for success. There remain a lot of systemic problems even if there are improvements, and things are changing enormously,” she says.
“In Canada, mental health is a much less taboo subject than in France”
The Olympic champion also denounces the system which allowed attackers like Gilles Beyer, accused of rape by Sarah Abitbol and now deceased, to continue to practice in the world of skating with complete impunity. “He made comments to us all day, he came into the locker room when we were changing. We knew that he already had a history of abuse and he took care of young people as if nothing had happened,” laments Gabriella Papadakis. “Everyone thought it was normal and everyone acted like it was normal. It is important to understand that these are not isolated acts, nor isolated people. It’s a climate,” she adds.
It is in particular this climate which led Gabriella Papadakis to burn out, even if she says she is much better today. In Canada, where the Clermontoise has lived since 2014, “mental health is a much less taboo subject than in France and that’s really good,” says the French skater.
During her career, she believes that she has not had enough mental support: “In sport, we prioritize performance so much that we forget people’s well-being. We think too much: “We don’t care if you’re not well, as long as you have medals… And if you have medals, you’ll be happy. » I believe we need to revisit this way of thinking in skating. »
