What Happened Between Clare Crawley & Benoit Beauséjour-Savard After ‘Bachelor Winter Games’?
It’s been two years since new Bachelorette star Clare Crawley and her Bachelor Winter Games co-star Benoit Beauséjour-Savard got engaged on live television, only to split two months later.
And now, with the 38-year-old handing out the roses for Season 16, fans are left wondering what really went wrong between the couple. Let’s journey back to Clare and Benoit’s short-lived romance and find out what happened between the formerly smitten pair.
First meeting
Clare and Benoit instantly connected after meeting on the first and only season of The Bachelor Winter Games which premiered in February 2018. What started as an innocent flirtation quickly grew into something more, but after the Sacramento native also expressed interest in contestant Christian Rauch, Benoit voluntarily left the show.
Clare followed suit and eliminated herself in the following episode.
Reconnection after filming
After leaving the show, Benoit reached out to Clare and asked if she was OK. “I thought that was the sweetest, sweetest thing anybody could say at that moment,” she previously revealed on the Mouthing Off With Olivia Caridi podcast. “And then we started talking and he was really sweet. We talked every day and FaceTimed every day. I would say like, four or five hours a day of talking.”
They ended up spending a couple of weekends together while the show was airing and re-established their relationship. “It was so much fun, we snuck out of the house, we went to sushi,” she said, adding that she made it clear to the former Bachelorette Canada contestant that she wanted to take time to get to know one another without the pressure of cameras.
The engagement
Soon enough, it was time for The Bachelor Winter Games: World Tell All special and Benoit had a surprise in store for Clare.
“The first day I met you I didn’t believe in love at first sight. You’re the strongest woman I have ever met in my whole entire life. You never give up on love and this is the best thing about you. And I will never, ever give up on you,” he told her before getting down on one knee and proposing.
“I’ve always wanted a man that wouldn’t give up on me,” the hairstylist told the audience — and Benoit — prior to the engagement. “You truly have changed my life because I didn’t even believe in myself. There were so many times I want to throw in the towel and say am I crazy for holding out for something so amazing? But he always has my back and puts up with my crazy. I just love you and I mean it.”
The split
By April 2018 — two months after shocking Bachelor Nation with their unexpected engagement — the couple announced that they had decided to part ways.
“We understand a lot of you have been asking about our relationship since the show, and we wanted to thank you all for the love and respect as we navigated it in real life off camera,” the couple shared in a joint statement at the time. “We do understand however, having a public engagement on TV kind of changes that. It’s with a heavy heart that we have mutually decided to end our relationship. We think the world of each other, and we were both hoping we could make this work.”
Where do Clare and Benoit stand today?
Amicable exes! It seems as though the former lovebirds are still on good terms today. After learning the news of Clare’s upcoming journey, Benoit took to his Instagram page to wish her well. “Congratulations to this gem!!” he wrote alongside a loving photo of the pair. “She will be an amazing Bachelorette. She is smart, fun, strong, knows what she wants and most importantly, she will call out the guys messing around!! Hell yeah!! Good Luck on your journey to find love @clarecrawley !! You will be the best 🙌🏼 #thebestbacheloretteever.”
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