By: Dylan Nazareth

Lily Hensen and Nathan Lickers have been skating together for a long time, but they still remember when they were first paired up. And it was all thanks to Alma Moir, mom to great Canadian ice dancer Scott Moir.

“It all started with Alma Moir,” recounted Lickers, speaking at Skate Canada High Performance Camp in August. “One day she approached me and asked if I wanted to try out dance.”

“I think it was Nathan and, like, nine girls,” said Hensen. “One after the other we went around the ice doing the Dutch Waltz, and then he kinda got to just choose. It was literally speed dating for ice dance.”

“I picked Lily, she just felt right,” added Lickers.

Fast forward fourteen years and the duo are still going strong. They continue to work with the Moir family at Ilderton Skating Club, just outside London, Ontario, with Scott as their coach. Having grown up watching Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir dazzle on Olympic ice, it’s still almost surreal for the pair that they work with him daily.

“I think our first year skating together was just after the 2010 Olympics, we were eight or nine,” said Hensen. “[Virtue and Moir] came to our arena and did a little seminar. We still have photos of that, of us with Scott, and we’re just looking at him like, what? It’s crazy to think that we just see him every day now, and it’s just so casual.”

Having worked with Moir for years now, Hensen speaks highly of what he’s done for her as a young female skater, and in her partnership with Lickers.

“He always pushes us female skaters to just be as bold and as confident as we can be,” said Hensen. “He’s taught me that my own strength is more than I’ve ever thought and that we have this power of being together for so long that we just have to use it.”

Canada has long been blessed with a wealth of talent in ice dance. This means at the upcoming Winter Olympics in Milan, Team Canada will send three dance teams to compete, the most of any discipline for the country. It also means there’s a lot of strong duos vying for one of those coveted spots. While they may be underdogs, Hensen and Lickers aren’t shy in sharing that they’re giving their all this season to fight for a spot in Italy. It’s an uphill battle for sure, but after their fifth place finish at Nationals last year, they got just the advice they needed to put some extra swagger in their step.

“Scott approached us after Nationals and was like, I believe in you, I think that this third spot is attainable,” recalled Hensen. “To hear that, I think our faces just kinda lit up. It’s a crazy feeling to have Scott Moir tell you he believes in you so much.”

“It definitely lit a fire under my butt,” added Lickers.

Hensen and Lickers continue to train at Ilderton Skating Club as they chase that coveted spot on Team Canada in Milan. Facing the biggest season of their skating careers yet, they’re grateful for the support they get from their home club.

“Growing up, we were at Ilderton Skating Club, and they’ve always supported us from day one, when we were, oh my god, nine or eight years old,” said Hensen. “They’re always so supportive and they always have our back no matter what. It’s nice to know that no matter what happens at a competition, we always come back to open arms. It’s just a very loving community.”

Hensen and Lickers began their season with a seventh-place finish at the Kinoshita Group Cup earlier this month in Osaka, Japan. Their next test comes later this week, competing in Oberstdorf, Germany at the Nebelhorn Trophy.