Guillaume Cizeron, who won 2022 Olympic ice dance gold with Gabriella Papadakis for France, plans to return to ice dance competition with a new partner, Laurence Fournier Beaudry, who has been competing for Canada.
“A new story begins,” the skaters said in a social media post announcing the partnership.
They want “to make France shine at the Milan Cortina Olympic Games in 2026,” according to a France figure skating federation press release.
A rep for the skaters said that Fournier Beaudry is in the process of obtaining French citizenship to make them eligible to compete at the Olympics together.
Cizeron, 30, and Papadakis, 29, announced a joint retirement on Dec. 3. Their last competition was March 2022 when they won a fifth world title together.
Fournier Beaudry, 32, placed ninth at the 2022 Olympics with Nikolaj Sørensen, then fifth and ninth at the last two World Championships.
This past October, Sørensen was banned for at least six years for sexual maltreatment, according to Canada’s Office of the Sport Integrity Commissioner.
With their previous partners, both Fournier Beaudry and Cizeron trained at the Ice Academy of Montreal.
After Papadakis and Cizeron left competition, Americans Madison Chock and Evan Bates won the last two World Championships in 2023 and 2024.
Later this month, Chock and Bates will bid to become the first ice dance couple to win three consecutive world titles in 28 years.
Amber Glenn reflected on long-ago memories of Jason Brown and Ashley Wagner, plus recent ones with a local school class.