Despite enormous challenges, Team Ukraine was able to shine at the 17th Summer Paralympic games, with 20 multiple medallists within its ranks, securing 7th place in the overall medal tally with 82 medals.
“We [have] shown we are ready to fight,” said Ukrainian swimmer Danylo Chufarov before the Games, a double-silver and double-bronze medal winner who survived the siege of Mariupol in 2022. “My country shall fight on the battlefield – and we shall fight in sport. That’s our mission.”
Danylo describes the arduous and hellish training conditions of Ukrainian athletes: constant air-raid alarms and the need to escape to bomb shelters, day and night; electricity shortages; and badly damaged sporting facilities. Many athletes were forced out of their training centres and even out of their home country, with the inevitable stress and disruption to their training. In many instances, coaches were unable to accompany them.
“Our athletes need to be strong like our soldiers,” said the president of Ukrainian Paralympic Committee, Valeriy Sushkevych.
The most decorated Ukrainian athlete of this games, swimmer Andrii Trusov (5 medals), who lives and trains in Kamianske, Dnipro region, said: “Every time our athletes climb onto the podium and the anthem sounds, we remind people about Ukraine”.
“We’re going to show the importance of Ukraine, and we’re going there to win,” said one of the displaced Ukrainian athletes Anton Kol (1 silver and 1 bronze in swimming).
The Ukrainian team numbered 139 athletes and deserves the highest praise. They competed in 17 sports out of 22 and won 22 gold, 28 silver and 32 bronze medals. Some of the multi-medalists included:
- Andrii Trusov – Swimming – 2🥇 3🥈
- Iaroslav Denysenko – Swimming – 2🥇 1🥉
- Ihor Tsvietov – Athletics – 2🥇
- Anna Stetsenko – Swimming – 1🥇 2🥈 1🥉
- Denys Ostapchenko – Swimming – 1🥇 2🥈
- Yehor Dementyev – Cycling – 1🥇 1🥈
- Nataliia Kobzar – Athletics – 1🥇 1🥈
- Oleksandr Komarov – Swimming – 1🥇 2🥉
- Viktor Didukh – Table tennis – 1🥇 1🥉
- Maryna Piddubna – Swimming – 1🥇 1🥉
- Oleksii Virchenko – Swimming – 1🥇 1🥉
- Danylo Chufarov – Swimming – 2🥈 2🥉
- Iryna Poida – Swimming – 2🥈 1🥉
- Olena Fedota – Fencing – 1🥈 2🥉
- Anna Hontar – Swimming – 3🥉
In a hugely disappointing outcome, almost 100 so-called “neutral” athletes were allowed to compete at the Paris Paralympics, despite Ukraine presenting “facts that vividly demonstrate the russian Paralympic movement is an active participant in the implementation of Russia’s deadly so called special military operation…”, said Sushkevych, the president of Ukrainian Paralympic Committee.
Ukrainian athletes even reported being called “Nazis” by the russian athletes. “They’re not neutral at all,” said Ukrainian Paralympian, Oleksandr Lytvynenko…
Photo credit: https://t.me/s/minmolodsport (official channel of Ministry of Youth and Sports of Ukraine)
