Denys Strekalin (born 31 March 1999) is a Ukrainian-born

pair skater Pair skating is a figure skating discipline defined by the International Skating Union (ISU) as "the skating of two persons in unison who perform their movements in such harmony with each other as to give the impression of genuine Pair Skating a ...

who competes for France. With his former skating partner, Cléo Hamon, he is a two-time French national champion (2020, 2021), 2018

Volvo Open Cup Volvo Open Cup is a figure skating competition held in Riga, Latvia. It was part of the ISU Challenger Series in the 2014–15 season. The competition may include men's singles, ladies' singles, pair skating, and ice dancing at various levels. ...

champion, and has competed in the final segment at three World Junior Championships (2017–2019).

Career

In Ukraine

Strekalin began learning to skate in 2006. Competing in men's singles, he placed seventh at the Ukrainian Junior Championships in 2013 and 2015. He also trained in

pair skating Pair skating is a figure skating discipline defined by the International Skating Union (ISU) as "the skating of two persons in unison who perform their movements in such harmony with each other as to give the impression of genuine Pair Skating a ...

with

Sofiia Nesterova Sofiia Nesterova ( uk, Софія Нестерова; born 21 August 2003) is a retired Ukrainian pair skater. With her former partner, Artem Darenskyi, she is a two-time Ukrainian national senior champion. The pair has competed in the final seg ...

Partnership with Hamon

Early seasons

In August 2016, Strekhalin teamed up with Cleo Hamon to compete for France in pairs. Coached by Mehdi Bouzzine in

Courbevoie Courbevoie () is a commune located in the Hauts-de-Seine Department of the Île-de-France region of France. It is in the suburbs of the city of Paris, from the center of Paris. The centre of Courbevoie is situated from the city limits of Par ...

, they made their international debut in February 2017, placing seventh in junior pairs at the

Bavarian Open The Bavarian Open is an annual international figure skating competition organized by the Skating Union of Bavaria. Since 2011, it is sanctioned by the Deutsche Eislauf Union and the International Skating Union. The event is held in February at Eiss ...

. In March, they placed fourteenth at the 2017 World Junior Championships in

Taipei Taipei (), officially Taipei City, is the capital and a special municipality of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Located in Northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about southwest of the n ...

, Taiwan. In September 2017, Hamon/Strekalin debuted on the

ISU Junior Grand Prix The ISU Junior Grand Prix of Figure Skating (titled the ISU Junior Series in the 1997–98 season) is a series of international junior-level competitions organized by the International Skating Union. Medals are awarded in the disciplines of men ...

(JGP) series, placing eighth in

Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the Ba ...

, Latvia. In December, appearing on the senior level, they won silver at the

French Championships The French Open (french: Internationaux de France de tennis), also known as Roland-Garros (), is a major tennis tournament held over two weeks at the Stade Roland Garros in Paris, France, beginning in late May each year. The tournament and ven ...

, behind

Lola Esbrat Lola Esbrat (born 29 August 1997) is a French pair skater. With her skating partner Andrei Novoselov, she has won three international medals and is the 2018 French national champion. Personal life Esbrat was born on 29 August 1997 in Paris. S ...

Andrei Novoselov Andrei Alexandrovich Novoselov (born 24 November 1989) is a Russian pair skater. Competing for France with Lola Esbrat, he has won three international medals and is the 2018 French national champion. Earlier, he represented Russia with Tatiana ...

. In March, they finished eleventh at the 2018 World Junior Championships in

Sofia Sofia ( ; bg, София, Sofiya, ) is the capital and largest city of Bulgaria. It is situated in the Sofia Valley at the foot of the Vitosha mountain in the western parts of the country. The city is built west of the Iskar river, and ha ...

, Bulgaria. Competing in the 2018 JGP series, Hamon/Strekalin placed sixth in

Linz Linz ( , ; cs, Linec) is the capital of Upper Austria and third-largest city in Austria. In the north of the country, it is on the Danube south of the Czech border. In 2018, the population was 204,846. In 2009, it was a European Capital of ...

, Austria, and fifth in

Ostrava Ostrava (; pl, Ostrawa; german: Ostrau ) is a city in the north-east of the Czech Republic, and the capital of the Moravian-Silesian Region. It has about 280,000 inhabitants. It lies from the border with Poland, at the confluences of four rive ...

, Czech Republic. Making their senior international debut, the pair took gold at the

in November 2018. In March 2019, they finished ninth at the 2019 World Junior Championships in

Zagreb Zagreb ( , , , ) is the capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Croatia#List of cities and towns, largest city of Croatia. It is in the Northern Croatia, northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slop ...

, Croatia.

2019–20 season

After placing eighth at the 2019 JGP United States, Hamon/Streklain debuted on the senior Challenger series with a seventh-place finish at the

2019 CS Finlandia Trophy The 2019 CS Finlandia Trophy was held in October 2019 in Espoo. It was part of the 2019–20 ISU Challenger Series. Medals were awarded in the disciplines of men's singles, ladies' singles, pair skating, and ice dance. Entries The Internatio ...

. They would go on to place tenth at the

2019 CS Warsaw Cup The 2019 CS Warsaw Cup was held in November 2019 in Warsaw, Poland. It was part of the 2019–20 ISU Challenger Series The 2019–20 ISU Challenger Series was held from September to December 2019. It was the sixth season that the ISU Challenge ...

and ninth at their first

European Championships The European Championships is a multi-sport tournament which brings together the existing European Championships of some of the continent's leading sports every four years. The inaugural edition in 2018 was staged by the host cities of Berlin, ...

. Hamon/Strekalin also won the French senior national title for the first time, due to the absence of

James James is a common English language surname and given name: *James (name), the typically masculine first name James * James (surname), various people with the last name James James or James City may also refer to: People * King James (disambiguat ...

/ Cipres from the competition season. They finished the season at the 2020 World Junior Championships, where they placed fifth. Hamon/Strekalin were scheduled to participate in the 2020 World Championships in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

, which would have been their senior World debut, but these were canceled due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

2020–21 season

With the pandemic ongoing, Hamon/Strekalin began the new season at the

2020 CS Nebelhorn Trophy The 2020 CS Nebelhorn Trophy was held in September 2020 in Oberstdorf, Germany. It was part of the 2020–21 ISU Challenger Series. Medals were awarded in the disciplines of men's singles, ladies' singles, pair skating, and ice dance. On August ...

, where only pairs training in Europe competed. They were fourth after the short program, and after the top-ranked

Hase The Hase is a long river of Lower Saxony, Germany. It is a right tributary of the Ems, but part of its flow goes to the Else, that is part of the Weser basin. Its source is in the Teutoburg Forest, south-east of Osnabrück, on the north slope ...

/ Seegert withdrew, they placed third in the free and won the bronze medal. Hamon/Strekalin were scheduled to make their

Grand Prix Grand Prix ( , meaning ''Grand Prize''; plural Grands Prix), is a name sometimes used for competitions or sport events, alluding to the winner receiving a prize, trophy or honour Grand Prix or grand prix may refer to: Arts and entertainment ...

debut at the

2020 Internationaux de France The 2020 Internationaux de France was scheduled to be the fourth event in the 2020–21 ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating, a senior-level international invitational competition series. It would have been held at Patinoire Polesud in Grenoble, F ...

, but the event was cancelled due to the pandemic. In February, they won their second straight National title. Later that month, they competed at the

International Challenge Cup The International Challenge Cup (formerly the Ennia Challenge Cup and the Aegon Cup) is an annual figure skating competition generally held during the last week in February, up till the 2021 edition held in The Hague, Netherlands. Since the 2022 e ...

, placing fifth. On March 1, they were named to the team for the

2021 World Championships 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1 ...

. They placed twentieth in their World Championship debut. Hamon/Strekalin finished the season at the 2021 World Team Trophy, where they finished fifth in both segments, and Team France finished in fifth place overall.

2021–22 season

Hamon/Strekalin began the season at the 2021 Lombardia Trophy, where they finished in fourth place. They were originally scheduled to compete at the

Nebelhorn Trophy The Nebelhorn Trophy is an international senior-level figure skating competition organized by the Deutsche Eislauf-Union and held annually in Oberstdorf, Germany. It became part of the ISU Challenger Series in the 2014–15 season. The competitio ...

, where the final Olympics spots would be decided, but were later replaced by Coline Keriven / Noël-Antoine Pierre. It was later announced that Hamon would be taking a break from figure skating due to health issues from burnout, and that had been the reason for them being replaced at the Nebelhorn Trophy.

Partnership with Hamon

2022–23 season

On January 31, 2022, Strekalin announced that he had formed a new partnership with former singles skater Océane Piegad. They made their competitive debut at the

2022 CS Nebelhorn Trophy The 2022 CS Nebelhorn Trophy was held on September 21–24, 2022 in Oberstdorf, Germany. It was part of the 2022–23 ISU Challenger Series. Medals were awarded in the disciplines of men's singles, women's singles, pairs, and ice dance. Entries ...

, where they finished in eleventh place, and were then invited to make their

debut at the

2022 Grand Prix de France The 2022 Grand Prix de France was the third event in the 2022–23 ISU Grand Prix of Figure Skating, a senior-level international invitational competition series. It was held in Angers on November 4–6. Medals were awarded in the disciplines of ...

. They finished seventh of seven teams at the event.

Programs

With Piegad

With Hamon

Competitive highlights

''GP:

; CS: Challenger Series; JGP:

Junior Grand Prix The ISU Junior Grand Prix of Figure Skating (titled the ISU Junior Series in the 1997–98 season) is a series of international junior-level competitions organized by the International Skating Union. Medals are awarded in the disciplines of men ...

Pairs with Piegad for France

Pairs with Hamon for France

Men's singles for Ukraine

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Strekalin, Denys 1999 births French male pair skaters Living people Sportspeople from Simferopol Ukrainian emigrants to France Ukrainian male single skaters