Dancing on Ice’s Michaela Strachan revals why her ‘not encouraging’ partner won’t be in audience

TV star Michaela Strachan has admitted that her partner, Nick Chevallier, won’t be cheering her on as part of the live audience when Dancing on Ice launches this weekend.

The Springwatch presenter, who lives in Cape Town, South Africa, has temporarily based herself in the UK to train with professional ice dancer Mark Hanretty, while Nick remains at home. “We haven’t made a plan for Nick yet because he is in South Africa,” she explains. “He may come over later on, it depends on how far I get. Certainly my mum’s coming, my brother’s coming, my son’s coming, my stepdaughter’s coming. So yeah, a lot of people are. And we’ve made a plan for them to have a party back at home to be able to watch it.”

Michaela adds that Nick has “not been very encouraging” about her deciding to sign up for Dancing on Ice 2025. “He just says it’s mad, but he doesn’t know the show, you know, he’s South African. He doesn’t know dance.” Another reason Nick may not be thrilled about Michaela competing is because he watched videos of skating accidents on YouTube with her before she signed up which “he thought was really bad.”

She also admits she has already had some injuries training for the show. “I’ve got some good bruises,” she says. “I actually had an injury before I got on the ice. I sprained my ankle quite badly. In fact, two months before we started I was actually on crutches.” The injury had nothing to do with skating, however. “I was running and I went over on my ankle and sprained it, and I did think ‘oh, it’s all right,’ as I hobbled back down the mountain. My partner’s going, ‘You’re doing Dancing On Ice! This is really not good.’ I thought yeah, that’s not good – injuries before you even hit the ice.”

Michaela explains that the reason she has signed up for the show is because “I’m a show girl at heart, I love a challenge and I enjoy fitness so to focus on something that will enable me to get fitter really appeals to me. I love the creative side of dancing, I trained in musical theatre a very long time ago. I really enjoy performing so to be able to go back to that which is something I’ve not been able to do for a very long time really excites me.”

At 58, she is one of the oldest skaters on the ice this year, along with Sir Steve Redgrave, who is 62, but she is also one of the most enthusiastic and is looking forward to performing to the live audience and viewers at home. “I think the creative element of the show is what I’ll enjoy most and the fact that you’re given a piece of music and then have to create a routine to accompany it excites me,” she says.

Appearing on the show is also something of a nod to her mum, who took Michaela skating when she was young. “My mother went through a phase where she used to do something fitness related every Friday,” she remembers. “One of her phases was ice skating lessons at Richmond rink so in the holidays we would go with her, so we probably did it more than the average child – but it was many moons ago.”

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