She's going for comedy gold in 'The Out of Shape Olympics'
Toronto woman Simona Stallone's TikTok series aims to show how a regular person would do at the Olympics
By the time Simona Stallone completed 20 kilometres of racewalking across Toronto's waterfront, she couldn't feel her legs.
"It was literally pain in every part of my body — pain in parts of my body I didn't know could feel pain," Stallone told As It Happens guest host Stephanie Skenderis.
Despite the physical price she paid for her efforts, she didn't make great time. She finished more than two hours slower than this year's Olympic racewalking gold medallists, and nearly an hour and a half slower than the last-place competitor.
That's because Stallone is neither an Olympian nor a racewalker. She's a 27-year-old real estate agent and self-described "unathletic random person" who is trying out Olympic medal events for her TikTok series, The Out of Shape Olympics.
'Why don't I just do it?'
The idea for the series, she admits, is not particularly original.
"Every single time the Olympic Games roll around, I see people … saying that they would love to see a regular, average person compete alongside the Olympians — just for reference, really, but also because it would be really funny," Stallone said.
She was talking about the concept over dinner one night with her boyfriend, she says, and going on and on about how hilarious it would be.
"And he goes, 'Why don't you just do it?' " she said. "And I went, 'Oh my gosh, why don't I just do it?' "
So far, aside from racewalking, Stallone has performed the 100-metre sprint, the cycling time trial, and several swimming events, including the 100-metre breaststroke, 100-metre backstroke, and 100-metre freestyle.
In every category, she's been twice as slow — or sometimes three times as slow — as even the slowest Olympic competitor.
"I don't do these things regularly," she said. "I'm just the average person."
So far, Stallone's perfectly average athleticism appears to be resonating with people. Some videos in the series have seen hundreds of thousands of views. Her breaststroke video has been seen more than half a million times.
"I knew we were on to a good idea just because so many people had asked for this before. But I didn't expect it to get to this level of popularity so quickly," Stallone said.
On TikTok, more visibility also means more feedback.
Some viewers have posted cruel comments about Stallone's weight, while others have insisted that she is, in fact, too athletic for the series.
But, by and large, she says the reactions have been overwhelmingly positive.
"I was so nervous of how it was going to be received, and now I'm, like, so grateful every day," she said.
Asked how it feels to be an "icon for out-of-shape people everywhere," Stallone rejected the label. But she says she hopes the series inspires people to go out and try new things, even if they're not going to be the best in the world at it.
"I'm just a girl providing some entertainment," she said. "If it helps somebody find a new hobby, a new type of physical activity they like to do, even better."
Interview produced by Cassie Argao
