Elizabeth Smart is opening up about her first-ever bodybuilding competition — and it didn’t go exactly to plan.
Smart, a kidnapping survivor who recently announced her new venture into muscle pageants, faced a problem onstage during her first contest when the costume jewelry ring on her finger got snagged in her blonde hair extensions.
“I just ended up ripping through the extension and just taking out a chunk of my hair, and then turning around and smiling,” Smart told NPR with a laugh.
The 38-year-old activist said that she wanted to run offstage after the blunder, but continued to pose in her high heels.
Since then, Smart has competed in four events and won several medals. She told the outlet: “I’m at a point in my life where I want to celebrate it. I don’t want to carry shame about my body.”
In 2002, Smart was kidnapped at knifepoint from her Salt Lake City home in the middle of the night while she was just 14 years old.
A nationwide search for her unfolded as she lived in the woods just miles from her home with her kidnappers, self-proclaimed prophet Brian David Mitchell and Wanda Barzee.
The search lasted nine months, during which Smart later testified that she was held captive and repeatedly sexually assaulted before she was rescued in 2003.
Mitchell is now serving a life sentence without parole for the kidnapping, while Barzee was released in 2018 after serving 15 years.
Smart previously said that the trauma she endured during her abduction was part of the reason she was inspired to take pride in her body and begin bodybuilding.
“My body has carried me through every worst day, every hellish grueling experience, it’s created and nurtured three beautiful children, my body has risen to every single challenge life has presented it with, and carried me through so I refuse to be ashamed of it,” she said in May. “I refuse to feel embarrassed about trying something new and am embracing my chance at life to the absolute fullest I can.”
She concluded: “I only hope that we all find the courage to chase new experiences, goals, bettering ourselves, and most importantly happiness.”
Smart launched the Elizabeth Smart Foundation, which aims to end sexual violence and offer help for victims, in 2011.
She told NPR: “I can be an advocate for women and children. But I also can step on stage in a bikini and strut around and strike a pose. And that’s OK.”