Gwendal Peizerat (born 21 April 1972) is a French former competitive
ice dancer. With
Marina Anissina, he is the
2002 Olympic champion, the
1998 Olympic bronze medalist, the
2000 World champion, and a six-time
French national champion.
Personal life
Both of Gwendal Peizerat's parents were involved in figure skating, his father serving as the general secretary of the French federation and his mother in charge of a club in Lyon.
[ His sister, Sandrine, is two years older.
Peizerat holds a management degree from EMLYON Business School, a DEUG in materials science, and a maîtrise in STAPS from ]Claude Bernard University Lyon 1
Claude Bernard University Lyon 1 (, UCBL) is one of the three public universities of Lyon, France. It is named after the French physiologist Claude Bernard and specialises in science and technology, medicine, and sports science. It was establis ...
.[ He has two daughters, Shanelle (born in 2012), and Lilas (born 21 December 2013). He released a single "Baby Rock" in 2014.][
]
Skating career
Early years
Peizerat started skating at age four[ when he and his sister followed their parents to the ice rink. He went into ]ice dancing
Ice dance (sometimes referred to as ice dancing) is a discipline of figure skating that historically draws from ballroom dancing. It joined the World Figure Skating Championships in 1952, and became a Winter Olympic Games medal sport in 1976. A ...
straight away. He was coached by Muriel Boucher-Zazoui since the age of six and throughout his entire career.[
Boucher-Zazoui paired seven-year-old Peizerat with his first partner, French skater Marina Morel, who was the same age as him; Morel and Peizerat skated together for fourteen years.][ They won bronze at the 1989 World Junior Championships and then silver in 1991. Morel retired in 1992.
]
Partnership with Anissina
Following the end of his partnership with Morel, Peizerat responded to a letter he had received a few months earlier from Russian World Junior champion Marina Anissina, who chose him after watching competitions on video.[
Anissina arrived in Lyon in February 1993 and wanted to take him to Russia but his family objected.][ She settled in France, focusing intensely on skating and insisting her partner, who was dividing his time between skating and his education, be equally focused on their career. Their first year together produced many quarrels and they came close to splitting up.][ Their coach Muriel Boucher-Zazoui, however, immediately felt it was a promising partnership, saying "They are like fire and ice".][
Anissina and Peizerat were selected for the ]1994 Winter Olympics
The 1994 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XVII Olympic Winter Games (; ) and commonly known as Lillehammer '94, were an international winter multi-sport event held from 12 to 27 February 1994 in and around Lillehammer, Norway. Hav ...
in Lillehammer
Lillehammer () is a municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Gudbrandsdal. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Lillehammer. Some of the more notable villages in the munici ...
but her French citizenship was granted a few weeks too late.[ The Olympics, unlike most skating competitions, require both partners to be citizens of the country they are representing.
Anissina and Peizerat won the 1998 Olympic bronze medal and ]1998
1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''.
Events January
* January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...
and 1999 World silver medals behind Anjelika Krylova and Oleg Ovsyannikov. The Russians retired due to injury and Anissina and Peizerat then developed a rivalry with the Italians Barbara Fusar-Poli and Maurizio Margaglio. The French won the 2000 European and World Championships.[
For their free dance program in the 1997—1998 season, Anissina and Peizerat used music from the ]Prokofiev
Sergei Sergeyevich Prokofiev; alternative transliterations of his name include ''Sergey'' or ''Serge'', and ''Prokofief'', ''Prokofieff'', or ''Prokofyev''. , group=n ( – 5 March 1953) was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor who l ...
ballet ''Romeo and Juliet''. At one point in the free dance, Anissina carried Peizerat completely off the ice and supported him on her hip, "as if to represent Juliet's emotional strength within the relationship". ABC correspondent Lesley Visser reported that this move had become their trademark and saw it as "a way of celebrating the opposite yet equal strengths of male and female".[>Kestnbaum, p. 247] Anissina and Peizerat continued to use the move in all of their free dances after 1998; figure skating writer and historian Ellyn Kestnbaum speculates that since they finished first or second in every competition during that period, they were not penalized for it, even though other dance teams might have used it as a gimmick rather than as an expression of their skating skills or an interpretation of their music.
In 2001, Anissina and Peizerat won European and World silver behind the Italians but surged past them in 2002 to reclaim their European title and become the Olympic Champions. At the 2002 Olympics, they led after the compulsory dances and the original dance. Their free dance, "Liberty", mixed music with sections from the famed freedom speech by Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, civil and political rights, civil rights activist and political philosopher who was a leader of the civil rights move ...
; a 5-4 split of the judges' panel had them in first place in this segment ahead of Irina Lobacheva and Ilia Averbukh, and they became the first French ice dancers to win the Olympic gold medal.[
After the Olympics, Anissina and Peizerat retired from competition but continued skating together for many years in shows around the world.][ During their career, they represented the club Lyon TSC. Their signature move was Anissina lifting Peizerat off the ice, switching the traditional gender roles in lifts.
Peizerat was named a Chevalier of the ]National Order of Merit (France) National Order of Merit may refer to:
* National Order of Merit (Algeria)
* National Order of Merit (Bhutan)
* National Order of Merit (Brazil)
* National Order of Merit (Ecuador)
* Ordre national du Mérite (France)
* National Order of Merit ...
in 1998 and a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour
The National Order of the Legion of Honour ( ), formerly the Imperial Order of the Legion of Honour (), is the highest and most prestigious French national order of merit, both military and Civil society, civil. Currently consisting of five cl ...
in 2003.[ He has done some choreography for other skaters.][
]
Post-skating career
In 2003, Peizerat founded a consulting firm, Soléus.[ He has also worked for ]Eurosport
Eurosport is a group of pay television networks in Europe and parts of Asia, owned and operated by Warner Bros. Discovery through its WBD Sports unit, it operates two main channels—Eurosport 1 and Eurosport 2—across most of its territorie ...
, interviewing athletes.[
In 2010, Peizerat was elected regional councillor on the list of the ]Socialist Party
Socialist Party is the name of many different political parties around the world. All of these parties claim to uphold some form of socialism, though they may have very different interpretations of what "socialism" means. Statistically, most of th ...
in the Rhone Alpes region and was subsequently appointed Councillor Delegate in charge of sports in the Regional Executive headed by Jean-Jack Queyranne.
Programs
With Anissina
With Morel
Competitive highlights
With Anissina
With Morel
References
External links
Official Website GwendalPeizerat.com
*
Marina Anissina and Gwendal Peizerat 1998 World Championships Free Dance
(English)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Peizerat, Gwendal
1972 births
Living people
People from Bron
French male ice dancers
Olympic figure skaters for France
Figure skaters at the 1998 Winter Olympics
Figure skaters at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Olympic gold medalists for France
Olympic bronze medalists for France
Olympic medalists in figure skating
World Figure Skating Championships medalists
European Figure Skating Championships medalists
World Junior Figure Skating Championships medalists
Medalists at the 2002 Winter Olympics
Medalists at the 1998 Winter Olympics
European champions for France
Emlyon Business School alumni
Season-end world number one figure skaters
Members of the Regional Council of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
Sportspeople from Lyon Metropolis
20th-century French sportsmen