Former Strictly star Ben Cohen selling shirtless photos after sharing money woes

Former Strictly Come Dancing contestant and retired rugby union player Ben Cohen announced in a post to fans this week that he's releasing his own calendar for next year

Former Strictly Come Dancing contestant Ben Cohen is releasing a racy calendar featuring shirtless photos of himself after airing his financial woes.

The retired rugby union player, 46 - who appeared on Strictly in 2013 - told fans on Instagram this week that he's releasing his own calendar for next year. Ben's post on Wednesday included two shirtless photos of him, which showcased his toned physique.

The calendar is listed at £32.95 and each one is said to be personally signed by Ben, with him having described it as a "limited run". He wrote in his post: "Excited to announce that my 2025 calendar is now on sale. Limited run of just 1,000! Huge thanks to my friend Leo @snootyfoximages for the great photos. As always a massive thank you for all the support."

The post comes after Ben spoke about experiencing financial issues just weeks ago. He made his remarks when his fiancée Kristina Rihanoff, 47, appeared in court last month after she was caught driving her Audi Q3 without insurance in Horsemarket, Northampton, on April 4.

Kristina was slapped with six points on her licence but faced a ban for totting up 12 penalty points. Last month, she went to court to appeal the conviction for driving without insurance with Ben appearing as her witness.

During the hearing at Northampton Crown Court, the court heard that the couple set up several businesses, including a Yoga studio, which had suffered as a result of Covid. Ben said: "I get up every day and I fight not to lose everything to lose my cars and my house and my relationship. I'm so overdrawn." When questioned about strains on his relationship, he said: "We're still living together. We're in it financially."

He continued: "We're in business together so the problem is that we opened the business before Covid and we got the worst severities of it and in all honestly this is just another problem for me to deal with. I've got credit cards that are overdrawn. I'm overdrawn in both accounts. We have got a business debt because of Covid. It's just another problem."

It was later reported that Ben and Kristina, who have a daughter together, had put their £1.75 million home on the market. The five-bedroom home in Northamptonshire was reportedly bought in 2016 and was put up for sale in September.

Ben confirmed that he had been solely responsible for sourcing insurance for the couple's cars. The court was told that he had been searching for cheaper insurance online at the end of February after being quoted £7,500 by a provider. Ben said he then took out a policy with Dial Direct on February 22, paying monthly by direct debit, and in March was abroad when he received a text message telling him they were going to cancel his insurance unless he sent them his no claims details.

Ben said that he didn't have a no claims bonus so did not send any details to the company and did not respond so the policy was cancelled on March 7. When asked if he knew, on April 14 when Kristina was stopped driving uninsured, that the policy had been cancelled, he said: "I 100 per cent did not know that policy would be cancelled because the no claims information they'd been asking for wasn't relevant to me." Recorder Louise Cox however rejected the appeal, but told Kristina that she had "every sympathy" with her.

Follow Mirror Celebs on TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Threads.