Photos by Robin Ritoss | Maria Bagdasarova contributed to this article.

France’s Célina Fradji & Jean-Hans Fourneaux have been skating together for nearaly 10 years and are competing in their first season on the senior circuit. They are coached by Karine Arribert and Mahil Chantelauze and train in Villard de Lans. Learn more about them in our Getting to Know series Q & A. 

Tell us about your individual skating journeys, including any early special memories. What drew you to ice dance?
Celina Fradji (CF): I started figure skating at the age of four, following my sister who was already skating. I’ve always loved jumping, as I was a very energetic child. When I was seven, a skater who did both figure skating and ice dance asked me to skate with him after noticing me in a competition. My parents encouraged me to try this new discipline, and I found it really challenging. I continued both disciplines until I was 14, before fully dedicating myself to my junior ice dance career.

Jean-Hans Fourneaux (JF): I started skating when I was around seven. I first tried with the school, then I liked it, so I continued it. At first, I did singles for a few months, just to learn the basics and have fun on the ice. Then I got offered a free four-day ice dance camp in Rouen, where I was already training. I thought, “why not?”, since I was doing okay on skates anyway. Funny thing is, for the first three days, I came home saying I didn’t like it at all and that ice dance wasn’t for me. But on the fourth day, something just clicked, I suddenly really enjoyed it. After that, I spent a year skating solo in ice dance, and then I started training with my first partner, with whom I skated for about four or five years.

One of my early memories that really stands out is our first international competition in Dortmund. During the free dance, we both fell twice. It’s kind of a “famous” moment now, but honestly, it’s part of the journey and I laugh about it still nowadays.

Tell us how your partnership started.
CF: We had also noticed each other at competitions, as we each had our own partners at the time and weren’t in the same category. Jean Hans and his partner were older. We knew each other from French competitions, but not personally. We didn’t really consider them as tryouts, it just felt natural, and we instinctively knew we were meant to skate together.

JF: Our partnership started back in 2016. At the French Championships in Le Havre that year, we both had different partners, I was competing in advanced novice, and Célina was in basic novice. Our moms met there and got along really well. They even joked that if one day we both stopped skating with our partners, they’d make us skate together. A few months later, that’s exactly what happened. We both ended our previous partnerships and decided to give it a try together, doing our first test skate in Bercy.

CF: We didn’t really consider them as tryouts, it just felt natural, and we instinctively knew we were meant to skate together.

JF: It went super well, and we’ve been skating together ever since. I moved from Rouen to the Paris region to train with her, and it’s been almost ten years now, kind of crazy when we think about it!

This is your first senior season. What are the key differences with the junior circuit they’ve noticed so far?
CF: The main difference with juniors is the atmosphere. Seniors seems much more calm because of their experience. They’re willing to start a conversation and talk about their training, whether it was easy or difficult, and then move on. It helped me stay more chill during the challengers at the start of the season.

JF: You can really feel that most of them see it as a passion-driven career, not just about chasing results. There’s also a clear difference in maturity on the ice, in the skating, in the styles, in the way programs are built and performed. For me, it honestly feels like the start of a whole new chapter in my career, and that’s really exciting.

You’ve just experienced your first senior Grand Prix. How did it feel?
CF: This first senior Grand Prix was a very valuable experience. It was exciting to have the chance to learn alongside the top skaters, but it was also mentally challenging. We were used to winning medals on the Junior Grand Prix, so ending the competition in 10th place was a change. But we know it’s part of the process and how we’ll grow, just like every other skater.

JF: Our first senior Grand Prix was the Grand Prix de France in Angers, and honestly, it was one of our best competitions so far. We had never been cheered for that much before, the crowd was amazing. At first, we thought it might make us nervous, but instead it gave us so much energy and motivation. We really loved the whole experience, both on and off the ice. After the competition, we even got to chat with some of the supporters’ team, which was super nice. It was definitely a moment we’ll remember.

Sharing the ice with experienced skaters. For example, for the rhythm dance you were in the same warm-up with Olympic Champion Guillaume Cizeron. How did it feel? 
CF: Yes, we were in the warm-up with Guillaume Cizeron and Laurence Fournier-Beaudry for the Rhythm Dance. Thinking back to when we were younger asking for autographs and photos, it’s really satisfying to now be competing in the same events and having nice conversations with them.

JF: During the first trainings before the competition, it was kind of funny to skate on the same ice as Guillaume Cizeron. But you get used to it quickly because you are focus on what you do, and because everyone here is at such a high level. Overall, the whole experience was really impressive.

Tell us about your programs this season. How did you come up with the concepts and select the music?
CF: For the Rhythm Dance, we wanted to skate to music from the ’90s that we knew, and that’s exactly what we chose. I mean, even today, I still listen to Destiny’s Child while cleaning my apartment, it’s so much fun! For the Free Dance, it was entirely Karine’s idea and arrangement, and we loved it immediately. We’re fans of the softness of Chopin, and we connected with it from the very first listen. We don’t get tired of it, so it’s important for us to skate to music that we really enjoy.

JF: We immediately connected with the concepts, especially because we love skating to music that people can really relate to, like in our rhythm dance. It’s just really fun to perform on music like that and feel the audience connect with it.

Share your opinions of the 1990’s Rhythm Dance.
CF: Personally, I was a bit disappointed when the theme was announced. It feels similar to what we’ve been doing for several years, and I was expecting something different. But of course, I’m not participating in the Olympics, so my perspective is from the outside, it might have something to do with the Olympic Games.

JF: I enjoy the 1990’s Rhythm Dance this season. It’s fun and energetic, and I like that it gives us a chance to explore a different style on the ice. The music and rhythm make it playful, but you still need precision, which makes it challenging in a really exciting way.

What do you hope next year’s Rhythm Dance theme will be?
CF: For next season, I hope there won’t be a Pattern Dance. I really love the program with the Choreo Step because it gives us the opportunity to develop our skills as dancers, compared to the Free Dance, which is very technical. I hope we continue in that direction. If it were up to me, I really enjoy Latin dances, and I’d be happy to have fun with that.

JF: I am excited to see what next year’s Rhythm Dance will be! Personally, I’d love to go back to some basics, like ballroom or Latin dances. It’s always fun to explore those styles and see how we can interpret them on the ice.

What do you like most about skating with each other?
CF: What I like most about our partnership is our natural connection. We’ve been skating together for 10 years, we know each other inside out, and it makes everything much easier. We really experience everything together and never feel alone.

JF: What I love most about skating with Célina is our constant support for each other. No matter the situation, good or bad, hahaha… we’re always there for one another, and people even recognize us for that. With so many worries and pressures in skating, it’s amazing to have that trust and reassurance right from the start.

You work also with Tiffany Zahorski. What kind of advice does she give you as a recent competitor? 
CF: Yes, we love working with Tiffany. She’s very open and willing to share her high-level career experience. She was an athlete who always gave her best, no matter the circumstances, and she helps me push my limits while explaining why. Even back in juniors, during smaller competitions to prepare for bigger events like the Grand Prix Final, she would emphasize the importance of every competition and make us give our best, which really helped me a lot.

JF: Working with Tiffany Zahorski is really valuable for us. She shares a lot about how her career unfolded, the mistakes she made, and her joyful moments. It gives us a clear reference point for our own journey, which is really important, especially as we navigate the start of our senior careers.

What have your biggest challenges been this season?
CF: The transition from junior to senior has been just as challenging as I expected. When we look at our technical elements, it’s clear that the requirements are very different. We used to get level 4 elements easily in juniors, but in seniors the execution standards are much higher. We have a lot of work to do to earn good technical scores and improve our execution.

JF: Competing in two senior Grand Prix events and three challengers, it is really important for us to show that we’ve earned our place and make a strong impression in our first season. Setting that foundation is important for the seasons to come.

What future competitions do you have for this season?
CF & JF: We have a second Grand Prix, Skate America, then the Challenger in Zagreb, and the French Elite Championships in mid-December.. After Christmas, we’ll do a few international competitions to finish the season.

What’s one word that describes your partnership?
CF: One word to describe our partnership: laughter. We’re always laughing, on and off the ice. It’s my favorite part of our career!

JF: Laugh

Please share anything you would like our readers to know about you as a team.
CF: It’s very important for us to mention that we’ve created a fundraiser to help us progress in our senior career. It will allow us to invest more in our development, work with choreographers and deepen our program concepts. Ice dance is an expensive sport, which is not always easy to manage. So, if you believe in us like we do, please consider sharing our fundraiser and making a donation if you can. We’d also like to thank our coaching team, our parents, our friends, and our fans who regularly send us messages and gifts.

JF: As a team, we just want people to know that we’re always there for each other, through everything, the ups, the downs, and everything in between. That’s kind of our thing, and it makes skating together really special and fun, and we have a team Instagram where we share our training, competitions, and little behind-the-scenes moments @celina_and_jeanhans.

CF: Thank you for the interview, it was a pleasure!