New Team Series: Sophia Feige & Wiles Middlekauff
Welcome to IDC’s New Team Series! For this series, we interview athletes who will enter the upcoming 2024-25 season in a new partnership, or debuted last season. In our fourth interview, we meet Sophia Feige & Wiles Middlekauff, novice ice dancers from the U.S. They debuted at the 2024 Dallas Classic where they finished third. Photos by Melanie Heaney.
Tell us about your individual skating journeys, including any early special memories.
Sophia Feige (SF): I started skating when I was around 5 or 6 years old in Plymouth, England, with Clive Shorten. After a year or so, my family moved back to the U.S. and I did not continue skating. In December of 2021, I went to a public session with my mom and some family friends, and found myself wanting to go back and skate more, which led to my mom eventually signing me up for learn-to-skate classes in January of 2022. My mom was a singles skater, and helped me significantly with finding coaches and training well. In November 2022, I decided to try ice dance, and competed in solo dance in the following season while training with Steven Bellanger and Svetlana Serkeli in Palm Beach, Florida.
Wiles Middlekauff (WM): My older brother and sister both skated, so I spent hours at rinks before I could even walk. One time they put me in a bucket and pushed me around the rink so I could be on the ice with them. I started lessons at age three because I wanted to do what they were doing. Over time, though, my motivation changed. I like to perform, and I enjoyed being able to make audiences smile at ice shows. When I was six, my family moved from Wisconsin to Canton, Michigan so my brother could train with Marina Zoueva. I started ice dance lessons with Marina and really enjoyed it. When Marina moved to Florida, I trained for a while at Detroit Skating Club before transferring to Novi to work with Igor Shpilband. I like to do things well, and I found that with ice dance I can strive for excellence and be a performer at the same time. My brother and sister no longer skate, but I am more serious about it than ever. I’m glad they got me started on something that has become such an important part of my life.
What drew you to ice dance?
SF: I was drawn to ice dance because I loved being able to dance to the music on the ice while skating with a partner. Since I started skating I’ve always enjoyed working on my skating skills. Learning and improving various turns, edges, and elements gives me a sense of accomplishment which motivates me to keep working harder for more.
WM: My brother began competing in ice dance when I was little, so I had a lot of exposure to the sport. For a long time I was doing both freestyle and dance. Although I enjoyed freestyle, I had to focus most of my time on jumps and not as much time on performing. With ice dance, every moment on the ice is a performance and I like that. I love it when I’m having fun and the people watching me are having fun too
Tell us how your partnership started (Partner Search, training mate, etc.) Describe the tryout.
SF: After the 2023 solo dance season ended, I had planned to not continue solo dance for the next season as I wanted to find a partner. At this time I was also looking for a new place to train with higher level ice dancers to push me to improve and with a more organized training environment. When my mom and I contacted the coaches in Novi, MI, in the middle of March to visit, I was offered to do a tryout with Wiles. The tryout went well and after a week I was offered to stay for an extended tryout. We officially began our partnership at the beginning of April.
WM: Sophia was looking for a new training center and decided to check out Novi. Since I was looking for a partner, we scheduled a tryout for when she was there. It can be intimidating for someone to come into a new environment and work with new coaches. I was impressed with how Sophia took on this challenge and adjusted quickly. We kept on skating together after the tryout, and then we met with the coaches and I said I wanted Sophia to be my partner. Everyone agreed, so we’ve ended up skating together from the first tryout all the way to today.
What is it that you already like most about dancing with your new partner?
SF: Wiles works hard while maintaining a positive outlook. We communicate well while training, and if I don’t understand something he will take the time to explain it and help me.
WM: Sophia has the great combination of a positive attitude and a strong work ethic. That makes it possible for us to have fun together while also working hard and rapidly progressing. Sophia is supportive and encouraging, and I feel like I can be myself with her. She has a great artistic sense, so we are able to grow together both as performers and athletes.
What experiences do each of you bring to the partnership?
SF: I have done several years of ballet when I was younger, and I am a hard worker who always strives for the best.
WM: I bring a lighthearted attitude, a strong work ethic, and multiple years of competition experience.
What has been the biggest adjustment for each of you so far in the partnership?
SF: I did not have many difficulties adjusting to the partnership. I am new to partnered dance so there were and still are many new elements and skills to learn, which was a challenge but we work hard together to learn.
WM: I’m finding it easy to work with Sophia, so not much adjustment has been necessary for me. It feels very natural. That’s probably one reason why we were able to go straight from a tryout to an extended tryout to a partnership. We’ve just had a nice compatibility that has enabled us to make progress quickly.
Tell us about your training site.
We train in Novi, Michigan, at Novi Ice Arena. Igor Shpilband has set up a full ice dance program here with lots of on-ice and off-ice lessons. Several ice dance teams train there with us and it is a very supportive environment. It is very inspiring to us to be on the ice every day with so many great teams.
Who are your coaches? Did either or both have to relocate? If so, tell us about the move(s).
We train with a great team of coaches including Igor Shpilband, Natalia Deller, Pasquale Camerlengo, and Adrienne Lenda on-ice, and Renee Perkovski (dance) and Oleg Ouchakov (lifts) off-ice. Sophia relocated from Boca Raton, Florida, to Novi, Michigan.
Who is choreographing your programs?
Igor Shpilband did most of the choreography as well as cutting the music for us. This is a great arrangement since he can tweak the choreography and the music at the same time whenever there is something we want to change. Also since Igor choreographed the program, he is able to coach us every day with the big picture of the performance always in mind.
If you could have a lesson with any ice dancer past/present, who would it be? Why?
SF: I would take a lesson with Tessa Virtue, because she is a very talented and accomplished skater, who is very inspiring. I would also take a lesson with Irina Khavronina. I love the way she moves with such fluidity and control, combined with her artistry and skating skills, making her a very nice skater to watch.
WM: To be honest, I already feel like I skate with the best coaches I know of. Igor has had such a significant impact on this sport and I feel privileged to be part of his legacy.
What is each of you looking forward to most this skating season? What will be your biggest challenge(s)?
SF: I am looking forward to continuing working and improving various aspects of our skating, alongside our upcoming competitions which include the ice dance final and hopefully Nationals.
WM: I look forward to seeing just how far we can go in this first year. One challenge will be taking the gifts and skills we have individually and bringing them together into a unified whole.
Please share anything you would like our readers to know about you as a team?
WM: There are lots of stories about how difficult the partner search process can be. My experience with Sophia is refreshing because it shows that two people with similar goals and attitudes can find each other and grow naturally into a partnership. I think our compatibility and common goals point to a bright future for our team.