Careers After Elite Gymnastics

[rlayt]

Did she retire?

She wanted to but feels she has no option but to go back to training.

After the Olympics, this champion speaks out about her financial struggles: internet users react strongly.

Gymnast Mélanie De Jesus Dos Santos struggling after the Olympics: confessions about her precarious situation and her forced return to gymnastics.

www.ma-grande-taille.com

“Living with her parents due to a lack of funds for an apartment, she works as an employee at Crégym Martinique to support herself, emphasizing that "gymnastics is not a professional sport, you have to win to earn money" .

Initially determined never to touch an apparatus again after Paris – "I hadn't set foot in a gym since,"she said in June on the French television program C à Vous – the champion finds herself forced to return: "Even if I don't want to go back to gymnastics, what am I going to do? I've never worked, I don't know the normal world." At 25, without a degree or professional experience, Mélanie De Jesus Dos Santos is forcing herself to do what she knows, regretting the lack of post-Olympic federal support that could have eased the transition.

The RTL video has exploded in views, generating a wave of solidarity for this "cry for help" regarding the precarious situation of non-professional athletes, often forgotten after the Olympic spotlight. Haters have also reacted angrily: "Delusional," "We're not going to feel sorry for her, she's young, she should go back to school," "Didn't your parents tell you not to bet everything on a sport that doesn't pay?" This backlash reveals the societal tensions surrounding women's sports and the life choices of athletes, which are often overlooked despite the family and personal sacrifices they make.

This testimony highlights a structural problem: the end of sponsorships after the Games, the lack of a safety net, and the accumulated mental pressure. Mélanie De Jesus Dos Santos implicitly calls for better federal and societal support for athletes at the "end of their cycle," transforming her struggle into a national debate on the value of elite amateur sport.

Through Mélanie De Jesus Dos Santos's story, the vulnerability of elite sport is laid bare: behind the excellence, the discipline, and the medals lie fragile trajectories, dependent on results and media visibility. Her testimony, far from being an isolated case, reminds us that many athletes operate within an uncertain economic model, where sporting recognition guarantees neither financial stability nor a smooth transition to a new career. The wave of emotion—ranging from empathy to incomprehension—sparked on social media underscores the urgent need to rethink the status of French athletes.

 

[Sasha]

I think she's previously mentioned wanting to come back so that Paris wasn't the final competition of her career. Understandable.

 

[rlayt]

Her feelings could have changed. Maybe she had that interview when she wasn’t feeling optimistic.

 

[Angelika]

Ellie Downie - is a pilates instructor running her own studio and retreats.
Nile Wilson - owns/runs a chain of gyms and quite a successful You-tuber.
Amy Tinkler - professional cheerleader?
Beth Tweddle - runs a kids gymnastics classes company and BBC go to pundit

 

[Rich]

At lease in NCAA you get a college education out of it.

 

[MaryClare]

I’ll be honest, I don’t have a lot of sympathy of Mélanie. She’s 25, not 18. She’s had several years to get in a better financial position. Especially since she was getting to train at a world class facility with world class coaches for free.

She benefitted from huge sponsors that would never normally sponsor a gymnast, due to a home Olympics. But that was always going to fall away afterwards, even if she’d had a successful games.

French citizens receive almost free university tuition, the undergrad fee is €200 per year.

Now I don’t doubt that the French fed could do a lot more to support its athletes, we have seen before what they are like. But she just comes across as entitled

 

[Sasha]

I don't think she came across as entitled at all.

 

[FlipSkippy]

I have mixed thoughts. I don't think she comes across as entitled. She seems to be humble and honest. But I am a bit confused as to why it seems she's taken a long time to reach this point of reflection. At WCC, she was privileged to me not only because of the free training, but also because she had more visibility into planning for the future compared to her French colleagues. As far as I can tell, all of the WCC elite gymnasts while she was there had a plan for their future careers by applying to college. Even her French-born coach's daughter (a diver) went to college with a plan for her future. So I don't understand how she was in this environment and didn't connect the dots and realize that she needed to have a plan too. Simone herself took remote college courses. Could she not have taken remote college courses too?

 

[Lisaelaine80]

I have mixed thoughts. I don't think she comes across as entitled. She seems to be humble and honest. But I am a bit confused as to why it seems she's taken a long time to reach this point of reflection. At WCC, she was privileged to me not only because of the free training, but also because she had more visibility into planning for the future compared to her French colleagues. As far as I can tell, all of the WCC elite gymnasts while she was there had a plan for their future careers by applying to college. Even her French-born coach's daughter (a diver) went to college with a plan for her future. So I don't understand how she was in this environment and didn't connect the dots and realize that she needed to have a plan too. Simone herself took remote college courses. Could she not have taken remote college courses too?

Agree. Was she under the impression that the French Federation was going to financially support her long-term? Are they known to do that? I’m surprised no one around her say down with her and had that conversation.

 

[rlayt]

I wonder if she had that interview at a low point in how she felt and it still might be a while before she stops feeling stuck. When you feel that way everything seems wrong and you might voice a lot of negativity about the future. How Mélanie felt then might not be how she feels now and it can be changed. I think she has more resources and options she hasn’t explore. If she did have expectations it was a mistake to expect only good things and that she might coast on the aftermath of a good Olympics.

 

[makam]

And, really, as a high level athlete, your career could be over with one random bad landing. If you have any money coming in, you need to be investing and saving. That her family (and coaches?) weren't helping her envision the "after" is a bit sad.

 

[Hatsumomo]

I wonder how much of whatever money she made was sent to support her family. It's not uncommon for the successful person to be held to strong expectations to financially support immediate and extended family members.

 

[ArnoldRimmer]

Other than the free coaching, which I realise is a huge caveat, it was a bit of a catch 22 situation. She missed out on the advantages of being in France like cheaper living and better services, but also couldn't access some of the main benefits of being an athlete in the US like NIL.

I sympathise, and I wonder whether there was much guidance available to her. But it would always be difficult to fund such niche circumstances for very long, and it's not new information that athletes don't compete forever. Maybe she had always thought she'd coach, or that she'd still be competing now, and the Paris experience put her off.

She's still young though. 25 is nothing!

 

[Matilda23]

Maybe it is difficult to see yourself as an ordinary normal person, after being special for a long time