Strictly’s Nadiya Bychkova and Kai Widdrington split after two years of dating
THE curse of Strictly Come Dancing has struck again - with Kai Widdrington and Nadiya Bychkova splitting up, The Sun can reveal.
The pair, the poster couple of the under-fire Saturday night show, were on tour together last month.
No third party is involved and pals say they “grew apart” after two “blissful” years together.
“It’s heartbreaking,” a friend said.
“Kai and Nadiya seemed like the most perfect couple and have been so, so blissfully in love.
“But the pressures of touring - being in each other’s space 24/7, and the stress of performing a sell-out show eventually took its toll.
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“After a tough few weeks, they sat down together and decided to call it quits. They remain incredibly close and are determined their split will not have any impact on the next series of Strictly - they remain consummate professionals, and nothing will change that.”
The Sun revealed how Kai and Nadiya started dating in 2022.
They fell in love while Nadiya, 33, from Ukraine, was partnered with then-BBC Breakfast presenter Dan Walker, and Southampton-born Kai, 27, was dancing with AJ Odudu.
They gave their first joint interview in January last year.
Kai told us: “I think I speak for most of the men in Britain when I say that they would find Nadiya absolutely drop-dead gorgeous — and I still have to pinch myself sometimes.
“We liked each other, and we were texting and having phone calls and so on, and yeah, it blossomed from there.
“Then one day I was like ‘do you want to go out for dinner?’, and it went from there.”
The couple share an English Bulldog, Snoopy, together and Kai admitted he could see himself proposing to Nadiya.
He added: “We are very happy together and we don’t want this to end. Of course we want to be together for life, so we will see where it goes.”
After they fell in love, Kai and Nadiya chose to keep their relationship low key on the set of Strictly.
Kai explained: “We knew that it would come out and that it would be a big thing, so we kept it private for as long as we could, which was both annoying and exciting at the same time.
“It was one of those things. We would go somewhere and only we knew we were there.
“Sometimes we would go out in disguise, or baseball caps pulled down low, etc, and we knew this period of time was only going to last a little bit
“We did let our bosses know as a professional courtesy, that was our decision.
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“The BBC were totally fine with it, plus our relationship never crosses into work.”
The Sun has contacted a representative of Kai and Nadiya for comment.
