Favorites of the ice dance competition in these 2022 Olympics, the couple Gabriella Papadakis / Guillaume Cizeron were crowned Olympic champions. The replay of their performance.
It’s done ! World champions, Olympic medalists… Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron finally obtain the ultimate consecration by being crowned Olympic champions in ice dancing this Monday February 14 at the 2022 Beijing Olympics. After a short program and a program absolutely majestic free, the French duo flew over the competition by once again beating the world record with 226.98 points to offer the 3rd gold medal to France. The Russians Sinitsina-Katsalapov take second place (220.51) ahead of the Americans Hubbell-Donohue (218.02).
“It’s quite indescribable. Time doesn’t really exist anymore. Before skating, I couldn’t believe that I hadn’t skated yet, that we hadn’t won yet. And afterwards, I couldn’t believe that we had already skated! Everything was mixed up. It’s a lot of relief to have done the performance that we did, to have skated well “launched Gabriella Papadakis. “I restrained myself from screaming a bit!” launched Guillaume Cizeron. “We’ve been dreaming of this for four years, or even more. Four years ago, we knew we were already capable of it, it was our goal, and it didn’t happen. And I think that this time, we really wanted it to happen.”
Biographies. Gabriella Papadakis was born on May 10, 1995 in Clermont-Ferrand while Guillaume Cizeron was born on November 12, 1994 in Montbrison, a small town located in the Loire department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region. The two discover each other around the ice rink of the Auvergne Clermont Danse sur Glace club, where Catherine Papadakis, Gabriella’s mother, trains, while Marc, Guillaume Cizeron’s father, is the president. It was Catherine Papadakis who pushed the duo to form when they were aged nine and ten respectively, before training them.
Their first season at international junior level took place in 2009-2010 before leaving Clermont-Ferrand and settling in Lyon in 2012 to take a step forward. Romain Haguenauer became their coach and they won the silver medal at the 2013 World Junior Championships in Milan, before making their senior international debut in 2013-2014. They fail to be selected by France for the Sochi Olympics, which prefers to send Vanessa James and Morgan Ciprès to Sochi. In the summer of 2014, they moved to Montreal, Canada, still with their coach Romain Haguenauer.
This is the start of the ascent. The duo competed in their first ISU Grand Prix finals (the highest level of competition in figure skating) and won their first titles on the world circuit before winning the French, European and world championships in 2015. A repeat treble in 2016, 2018 and 2019. In Pyeongchang, at the 2018 Winter Olympics, the couple won the silver medal after having a costume problem.
If they form a fusional duo on the ice, the two figure skaters Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron are not a couple in life. “However, we are like an old couple, it’s as if we had been married for 30 years” confessed, in The ParisianGuillaume Cizeron in 2018. And nothing more between the two Frenchmen, who however sowed doubt during the 2015 World Championships. The day of their first world title in Shanghai, their performance had ended with a magnificent kiss, but without any meaning.
The French duo won the silver medal in Pyeongchang, but could certainly have done better without a costume problem. Just ten seconds into their short program, Gabriella Papadakis’ neck strap came loose, making the top of her costume looser and distracting the couple in their tricks. “She thought more about not finishing completely naked than skating,” summed up their coach Romain Hagenauer.
A great 2nd place for the Papadakis/Cizeron couple in ice dancing after the short program! ????????????????????????? #pyeongchang2018 pic.twitter.com/C9yvI1ToOm
— francetvsport (@francetvsport) February 19, 2018
Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron are quadruple world champions (2015, 2016, 2018 and 2019), five-time European champions (2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019) and seven-time French champion (2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2022) but also Olympic vice-champions (2018). They have also won 12 ISU Grand Prix Finals.
Guillaume Cizeron decided to publicly reveal his homosexuality on May 17, 2020, during the world day against homophobia and transphobia, without revealing the name of his companion. However, the skater “doesn’t really consider it a coming out”, as he confessed to the magazine Stubbornbecause he had “never spoken publicly about (his) sexual orientation”.