New Team Series: Lily Wheelahan & Wolfe Jin
Welcome to IDC’s New Team Series! For this series, we interview athletes who entered the 2025-25 season in a new partnership, or debuted last season. In this interview, we meet Lily Wheelahan & Wolfe Jin, junior ice dancers who represent the USA.
Tell us about your individual skating journeys, including any early special memories.
Lily Wheelahan (LW): I started skating when I was 11 and was immediately drawn to Ice dance rather than freestyle. I competed in solo dance for two years before seriously looking for a partner.
Wolfe Jin (WJ): I started skating when i was 8 years old and as a freestyler and competed up until intermediate. After, I began my solo dance journey and quickly saw an improvement in scores, and later found a passion in ice dance.
What drew you to ice dance?
LW: I was first drawn to ice dance when I watched Meryl Davis and Charlie White skate. I thought ice dance had a beautiful connection between partners through music and expression that I wouldn’t be able to achieve through freestyle.
WJ: What really drew me into ice dance was the artistic and creative freedom you get with your moves and choreography.
Tell us how your partnership started.
We had our tryout in November 24 and we began skating together January of 2025, but we got to actual training a few weeks after that. Our partnership started because of Partner Search. After the tryout, our coaches and us immediately saw potential with our partnership.
LW: I moved up competitively 3 levels in between this season and last season and I am super proud of how I’m doing!
WJ: I was able to represent ice dance on a reality tv show called All Round Champion.
What is it that you already like most about dancing with your new partner?
LW: My favorite thing about dancing with Wolfe is the way he can come up with creative elements to try and how much he supports me on and off the ice while helping me become a better skater at the same time!
WJ: Something I like most about dancing with Lily is her ability to dance and leave all of her facial expressions and performance on the ice.
What experiences do each of you bring to the partnership? (International competitions, training, etc.)
LW: I competed in gymnastics before I started skating and kept a lot of my skills. I also have good work ethic and the ability to learn quickly while having great athleticism!
WJ: Some experiences I bring to the partnership is the training I’ve got from many talented groups. I also bring my past freestyle experience for some cool tricks here and there
What has been the biggest adjustment for each of you so far in the partnership?
LW: The biggest adjustment for me in this partnership has been how much my skating skills have had to change. I needed to learn better technique and get to the level I needed to be at through tests and practice.
WJ: The biggest adjustment for me in the partnership would probably be taking a small teaching role in the partnership and being as helpful as possible in the partnership.
Tell us about your training site.
WJ: Our training site is in Ashburn, VA and we train alongside Brendan and Caroline Mullen. Lily and I take ballet 3 times a week and skate from 8AM-3PM. We also go to the gym as much as we can and go running with our coach a few times a week.
Who are your coaches? Did either or both have to relocate? If so, tell us about the move(s).
Our head coach is Ruslan Goncharov. Other coaches who are helping us at our rink are Alper Ucar, Kitty Kelly McGorry, and Maxim Katchanov.
Who is choreographing your programs. Is someone else arranging your music? If so, please share those experiences.
We have had many talented choreographers this season including Ruslan, Alper, Marina Zoueva, and Ilya Tkachenko.
If you could have a lesson with any ice dancer past/present, who would it be? Why?
LW: I would love to have a lesson with Tessa Virtue because I am huge fan of her skating technique!
WJ: As long as the person coaching me can push me and coach me to be an even better skater I’ll have a lesson with anyone
What is each of you looking forward to most this skating season? What will be your biggest challenge(s)?
WJ: We are looking forward to meeting new people and getting some competitions under my belt, I am extremely excited to compete since it’s been almost 3 years since my last competition. We think our biggest challenges will be getting used to each other and finding the flow most of the other experienced teams have, but we are certain we will be able to get over that after a few competitions together.
Tell us about your debut competition this season?
Our debut competition was at the 2025 Paradise Classic and while we didn’t get the score we hoped to we definitely learned so much and we are going to use the experiences we had at that competition to make ourselves even better.