Smart’s choice for historic competition - the British skater competing for Spain

Traditionally, the figure skating season ends with the World Championships. The ISU Worlds 2025 held in Boston recently were successful for Spain's representatives Olivia Smart and Tim Dieck who won a small bronze medal for the free dance. Their sixth place overall will give Spain an Olympic quota and opens up the option of securing a second at the Pre-Olympic in September.

The pairing of Olivia Smart and Tim Dieck is very new, although both athletes have extensive experience dancing with other partners as well as performing for other countries. Olivia Smart was born on 1 April 1997 in Sheffield. Fifteen years ago, Olivia teamed up with Joseph Buckland and represented Great Britain for five years. In 2015, Smart teamed up with Spanish ice dancer Adrián Díaz. The following year, Olivia became a Spaniard and began competing for Spain after the British Skating Association had let her go.

Three years ago, the Spanish federation announced that Díaz was retiring from the sport and that Smart would ‘follow a new sporting path’ with the federation. Olivia's path nevertheless led her back to the UK, where the ice dancer became a new professional skater for series 15 of ITV's show Dancing on Ice.

At the same time, Olivia Smart was developing a new competitive partnership with Tim Dieck. The German ice dancer was born in Dortmund on 7 April 1996. Until 2022, he competed for Germany together with Katharina Müller. The Anglo-Spanish Smart and the German Dieck teamed up in April 2023. The newly minted pair considered representing Spain or Germany, but the Spanish federation offered more financial support. Thus, Tim needed to take Spanish citizenship, which he did in 2023.

The Spanish pair's first test was at Skate America 2024, where they showed a new personal best and won a bronze medal. Smart said the free dance score helped her feel that finally all their hard work had paid off. Last December, Smart and Dieck won their second consecutive national title at the Spanish Championships, earning them the right to represent Spain at the European and World Championships. Their debut at the European Championships in Tallinn resulted in a fifth place finish. At the World Championships in Boston, Smart and Dieck placed eighth in the rhythm dance (77.21), setting a new personal best. In the free dance, they set another record with 123.71 points, placing third in the segment and moving up to sixth place overall.

Olivia and Tim's performance in Boston was thus a new achievement for Spanish ice skating and the first ever opportunity to be represented at the Winter Olympics by two pairs in ice dance. (In this case together with a young couple, Sofia Val and Asaf Kazimov, who in 2023 received his release from the German Skating Union to compete under the Spanish flag).

The story of a Spanish couple consisting of a British woman and a German man is becoming more and more familiar these days. Most European countries have legislation that allows governments to grant citizenship by decree for achievements in sport, culture or science, or because it is in the country's interest. It's great that with the help of foreign input Spain is becoming a significant power in ice dance, where in men's singles, Madrid native Javier Fernandez has already made history.