French diver slips during Paris Olympics pool inauguration

French diver Alexis Jandard fell off his springboard during the inauguration of the Paris Aquatics Centre as President Emmanuel Macron watched on.

Few Olympic events match the coordination and grace of synchronized diving — but it can also be quite a spectacle when it goes wrong.

Thankfully Frenchman Alexis Jandard also saw the funny side when he fell off his springboard Thursday at the inauguration of the Paris Aquatics Centre, one of the venues for this summer’s Games.

Wearing the tricolor trunks of his homeland and eager to impress the star guest, French President Emmanuel Macron, Jandard bounced once, twice… before slipping, falling onto his back and tumbling haphazardly into the water. The levels of slapstick were only enhanced by the other two divers causing barely a ripple from 3 meters up.

“J’ai glissé chef” — or, “I slipped, boss” — Jandard, 26, posted to Instagram later Thursday alongside a picture showing how the diving board had lashed bloody scrapes across his back. 

French diver Alexis Jandard falls onto the board during a demonstration at the the Olympic Aquatics Centre in Saint-Denis, north of Paris on April 4, 2024. Metropole Du Grand Paris / AFP - Getty Images“I fell in front of the president. I fell in front of the whole of France,” he said, smiling while giving a walk-and-talk “debrief” on Instagram stories. “I’ve broken boards before, but the board had never broken me before. Now it has. I would have preferred this ceremony to have gone well from start to finish. There was that little hitch. If it made people smile a little, so much the better.”

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/olympics/french-diver-slips-paris-olympics-pool-inauguration-rcna146532

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