In one of the early highlights of the 2018 Winter Olympics, South Korean figure skater Yura Min’s wardrobe malfunction has gone viral.
The 22-year-old was in the midst of a routine in front of an adoring crowd in her home country when the skimpy red top that she was wearing kept slipping for a peekaboo moment at the worst of times.
Only seconds into her ice skating routine, the hook on her top came undone as she was spun around by partner Alexander Gamelin. Had Ms. Min not been able to keep it from slipping off completely she could have set a record as the first topless performer at an Olympic event.
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Whoops! Wardrobe malfunction mars Olympic debut for ice dancers. #Pyeongchang2018 #Olympics @jellingworth https://t.co/obShfHbgFh pic.twitter.com/18OsqBzZee
— AP Sports (@AP_Sports) February 11, 2018
Via the Associated Press, “Whoops! Wardrobe malfunction mars Olympic debut for ice dancers”:
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Five seconds into your Olympic debut, you suffer a wardrobe malfunction. What do you do? Keep your shoulders back and keep smiling.
That’s exactly what happened to South Korean ice dancers Yura Min and Alexander Gamelin during their performance in Sunday’s team event. A hook on the back of Min’s red dress slid loose, threatening to reveal rather more than it already did.
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“I know that if this comes undone, then the whole thing is going to come undone. So I had that panic,” she said. “That wouldn’t be the most ideal Olympic experience, obviously. The whole time in the back of my head I was just thinking: ‘Keep your back straight because it might come down.”
Things got worse during the twizzles – a synchronized side-by-side spin – when Min felt the dress slipping off her shoulder and down her arm. She had to react fast to stop her Olympic debut being remembered alongside Janet Jackson’s halftime performance at the Super Bowl in 2004.
“It started to come down so I had to stop my twizzle and pull it back up,” she said. Gamelin added: “We were skating well – you just had to keep everything, well, intact.”
There was a #KOR wardrobe malfunction during ice dancing #Pyeongchang2018 pic.twitter.com/cRd6QKQdXF
— Rob Williams (@RobTheHockeyGuy) February 11, 2018
Additional details are provided by the Detroit Free Press:
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You ever had that dream where you are standing in front of a group, and you are totally naked?
Well, that’s what Yura Min was frighteningly close to experiencing. In real life. On world-wide television. In her Olympic debut.
Min, an American citizen who trains at Novi Ice Arena, had a wardrobe malfunction on Sunday while competing in the figure skating team event for South Korea.
“Five seconds into the routine, my hook came undone,” Min said.
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Not just any hook.
It was the hook in the back of her costume that basically holds the whole thing together.
“I was like, ‘Oh no!’ ” she said. “If that comes undone, the whole thing could just pop off. I was terrified the entire program.”
But what did she do? Stop and fix it?
“I didn’t stop,” she said. “I went from the beginning to the end. I didn’t stop because you get a deduction if you stop in the middle of a program. In my head, I was thinking, ‘Is it better to stop and fix it and get the deduction or keep going?’ ”
She kept her cool and came through it like a pro, though, and years from now will likely be one of the people who is still remembered from the 2018 games regardless of whether she wins a medal.
