Nika Osipova & Dmitry Epstein

[ladyjane]

Nika Osipova and Dmitry Epstein are a Dutch Pair that has started out together in 2021.

Nika Osipova is a Russian-born Dutch pair skater (born 2nd of February 2001 in St. Petersburg). Osipova formerly represented Russia with Aleksandr Galliamov as a junior during the 2016–2017 skating season. Together, they won the Volvo Open Cup in November 2016. They were also 9th at the Russian Junior Championships and 3rd at the Russian Cup Final.

Nika Osipova then skated with Tarasenko, who switched from singles. As it was Tarasenko’s first season in pairs, they didn’t do too great (he was learning from zero). Then after just one season Tarasenko decided that pairs was not for him. Osipova was then searching for a partner, and a Czech skater -Bidar - wanted to skate with her. They trained together for a few months, but because of Osipova’s past results (with Galliamov) the Russian federation decided that they would not release Nika to skate for the Czech Republic. Then she skated one season with Bushlanov, I am not sure what went wrong there, but after one season they split up and Bushlanov went to represent Belarus.

Osipova began competing for the Netherlands with Dmitry Epstein in February 2021.

Dmitry Epstein was born in the Dutch town of Enschede on the 10th of August 1993. He first started skating with his twin sister Rachel Epstein and enjoyed a moderate level of success. They took part in the World Junior Championships 3 times and were 17th, 17th and 16th respectively (2011, 2012, 2013). They also took part in the JGP series and in various competitions like the NRW Trophy, the Bavarian Open and the Challenge Cup. They were Dutch Junior Champions three times. After Rachel retired Dmitry started out in a partnership with Liubov Efimenko, a Russian born Finnish skater, in 2018 . They started off quite well, with finishes of 4th at the Challenge Cup in 2019 and 11th at the Nebelhorn Trophy in 2019. Eventually the partnership did not work out, and they split.

Season 2020-2021
At the end of 2020 Nika and Dmitry started training together, and they entered their first competition together at the Challenge Cup in February 2021. After a good start on the first day they got the minimum TES for the Short Programme to qualify for the 2021 World Championships. However on the second day of competition, they didn't qualify due to a fall and a missing of one lift. Their rivals, Daria Danilova and Michel Tsiba, also took part in the competition and surpassed them in the Free Skate (though not in the overall standing) but did not need to get their minimum TES as they already had attained them.

Season 2021-2022
Due to a severe bout of covid in the summer suffered by Dmitry, their first outing in the 2021-2022 season at the Finlandia Trophy regrettably was not a big success as they were last (15th). However, they improved on those results at the Bavarian Open in Oberstdorf and The Challenge Cup in Tilburg, where they were 3rd twice.

Season 2022-2023
The first half of the season was a busy one, as they competed 5 times, of which one time at a GP (Espoo Finland) and three times at a Challenger competition. They were second at the IceChallenge in Graz but the pairs part of the Competition did not count as part of the Challenger Series.

The pair is coached by Dmitry Kaplun and Aljona Savchenko (in Heerenveen at the National Training Centre). Nika and Dmitry both also coach/train Adult and Younger Figure skaters in their Home Base of The Hague.

Talentboek link (for donations towards their training costs): https://sport.talentboek.nl/talente...rijden/ondersteun-onze-weg-naar-ek-en-wk.html

ISU bio: http://www.isuresults.com/bios/isufs00110720.htm

Wikipedia:
Nika - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nika_Osipova

Rink Results:
Nika - http://www.rinkresults.com/skater?skater_name=Nika_OSIPOVA

Skating Scores:
https://www.skatingscores.com/ned/pairs/nika_osipova_dmitry_epstein/

Social Media

Instagram
Nika - https://www.instagram.com/nika.0s/
Dmitry - https://www.instagram.com/dmitryepstein/

ISU Personal Bests

Personal Best Total Score	167.14	09.12.2022	ISU CS 54th Golden Spin of Zagreb 2022
Personal Best Score Short Program	58.10	08.12.2022	ISU CS 54th Golden Spin of Zagreb 2022
Personal Best Score Free Skating	109.04	09.12.2022	ISU CS 54th Golden Spin of Zagreb 2022

Programs and Videos
2022/23
SP: Exit Music (for a Film) by Radiohead
FS: Prelude (Age of Heroes) by Balazs Havasi

2020/21
SP: "Seven Nation Army" performed by Postmodern Jukebox, ft. Haley Reinhart
FS:

2021 Challenge Cup
SP: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InodcSGAWiE

Results​

Competition	SP Score	FS Score	Total Score
2022/2023 Season
2023 European Championships	7 (54.16)	9 (94.78)	8 (148.94)
2022 Golden Spin	7 (58.10)	4 (109.04)	4 (167.14)
2022 Grand Prix Espoo	6 (47.97)	5 (90.13)	6 (138.10)
2022 IceChallenge Graz​	2 (57.70)	2 (100.37)	2 (158.07)
2022 Nebelhorn Trophy​	7 (52.09)	9 (93.97)	9 (146.06)
2022 Lombardia Trophy​	3 (52.10)	4 (97.14)	4 (149.24)
2021/2022 Season
2022 Challenge Cup	3 (51.43)	3 (88.51)	3 (139.94)
2022 Bavarian Open	1 (54.98)	3 (79.39)	3 (134.37)
2021 NRW Trophy	2 (38.50)	2 (84.94)	2 (123.44)
2021 Finlandia Trophy	12 (46.29)	15 (72.71)	15 (119.00)
2020/2021 Season
2021 Challenge Cup	6 (52.44)	7 (87.58)	6 (140.02)

Interviews/Articles​

News Feature (in Dutch): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32dvEfQi_ao

 

[ladyjane]

Ekaterina Geynish/Ilya Mironov confirmed as a new pair by Nina Mozer, who says that the reason for the split of Mukhametzianova/Mironov is due to her growth, which makes sense. They say that she can jump all triples and 3-3, though there is still a long way to go in terms of consistency and maintaining that through puberty. https://mobile.twitter.com/empresswenjing/status/1399740370783715329

I think this post belongs to another thread.....

 

[eterislouisvuitton]

I think this post belongs to another thread.....

Sorry about that, I clicked on the wrong one, though I love Nika and Dima as well

 

[ladyjane]

Nika and Dmitry will be competing at Finlandia Trophy Espoo 7-10 October 2021.

 

[hanca]

When introducing Nika Osipova, you missed a few interesting details.

As you said, she used to skate with Galliamov. The pair looked quite promising, in their first season they already scored 170 (which is a decent score for juniors in their first season) and qualified to junior nationals. Unfortunately, during the season 2016-17 Mishina/Mirzoev split up and as Mishina had the silver from junior worlds, the coaches split up Osipova/Galliamov and gave Galliamov to Mishina. (There was some interview online, she said that the split was quite unexpected. She was quite polite about it, no bitching, but she left Velikov’s group after this, so I think she was quite upset about how this was done.)

Nika Osipova then skated with Tarasenko, who switched from singles. (Tarasenko is Julia Lipnitskaya’s husband now). As it was Tarasenko’s first season in pairs, they didn’t do too great (he was learning from zero). Then after just one season Tarasenko decided that pairs is not for him.

Osipova was then searching for a partner and Czech skater -Bidar - wanted to skate with her. They trained together for a few months, but because of Osipova’s past results (with Galliamov) the Russian federation decided that they will not release Nika to skate for the Czech Republic. So Bidar found himself another Russian partner to skate with (Liza Zhuk) and Nika was again without a partner. (My personal opinion is that Nika is a better skater than Liza, more consistent with her jumps, but what could be done.)

Then she skated one season with Bushlanov, I am not sure what went wrong, but after one season they split up and Bushlanov went to represent Belarus. When they skated together, their marks were pretty decent, three competitions and all scored 179-184, in their first (and only) season together.

So Nika was quite unlucky with her partners; I hope her new partnership will work out! She deserves it.

 

[ladyjane]

Thank you so much @hanca for that update. I used the Wikipedia information, which is quite short and doesn't go into detail at all. I'm definitely going to use some of this information when I update the fanfest (after Finlandia).

 

[hanca]

Thank you so much @hanca for that update. I used the Wikipedia information, which is quite short and doesn't go into detail at all. I'm definitely going to use some of this information when I update the fanfest (after Finlandia).

Yes, I don’t have this from wikipedia. I have been following her career because I found her interesting. I don’t even remember what exactly it was that made me notice her five years ago, because there is plenty of junior pairs, but there was something in her.

 

[ladyjane]

Regrettably Nika and Dmitry did not have the outing they wished for at Finlandia Trophy. Their SP knew some stumbles but the FS was quite disastrous. They ended in 15th and last. Such a pity.

However, there was a really good reason for their problems. In a just published article on the Dutch Skating website it became clear that Dmitry had suffered a bout of Covid-19 last summer, but he also got lung-covid and had a lot of problems.

A summary in English: being out of breath all the time and having wobbly legs don't help in preparing and performing a programme. In the article there's a description of a kind of horror story about what he went through these past months. He calls himself a panting post horse, but also states that the worst is past.

The good news is that their results have not discouraged them too much, and they will continue to train and compete. Their next outing will be at NRW Trophy in Germany early November.

Dmitry Epstein: het hijgend postpaard is bijna weer een paarrijder | Schaatsen.nl

Dmitry Epstein ondervindt nog last van Long Covid bij Finlandia Trophy

www.schaatsen.nl

 

[hanca]

To be fair, they haven’t been skating together for that long, relatively speaking. I wouldn’t expect any miracles immediately, let’s give them time and we will see what they can do. Some pairs are taking a while to get everything together.

 

[ladyjane]

Some news: Nika and Dmitry will skate at the Ice Challenge in Graz this weekend. No Challenger but still couples from 5 countries. I wish them well and success!

 

[ladyjane]

Some more news: Nika and Dmitry will be skating at the Espoo GP.

 

[ladyjane]

Nika and Dmitry were second, earning a silver medal, at the IceChallenge in Graz. Hurrah!

 

[ladyjane]

I updated their fan page a bit.

 

[gsk8]

 

[gsk8]

 

[gsk8]

 

[ladyjane]

Nika was heartily welcomed back to coaching in The Hague yesterday. She seems to be a good coach for those who are part of her team (and have to miss her whenever she's in Heerenveen for training or travelling for competitions). She did well at Europeans (as did Dmitry) and now we can have two pairs at Europeans! Yay!