The Sochi Paralympics only recently started, on March 7, but Ukraine’s Paralympic team already has jumped to third place in the medal count.
Russia, however, the host country, leads the way, with its athletes winning 34 medals in just four days.
Ukraine’s team has medaled 11 times: three gold, three silver and five bronze medals.
The Ukrainian team decided to participate in the games despite a proposed boycott over the invasion of Crimea by Russian troops. The boycott was backed by Valeriy Sushkevych, the president of Ukraine’s Paralympic Committee.
Twenty-two of Ukraine’s athletes did, however, boycott the opening ceremony on March 7. Only biathlete and flag bearer Mykhaylo Tkachenko participated.
Shortly after the games began, biathlete Vitaliy Lukyanenko won the first gold medal for Ukraine in the men’s 7.5 kilometer sitting event. Rumors had it Russia’s President Vladimir Putin refused to congratulate Lukyanenko, as he was 11 seconds faster than Russian sportsman Mykola Polunin.
Lukyanenko is among the most experienced Ukrainian Paralympic athletes. The Sochi Games are his fourth Paralympic games.
On March 10, Lukyanenko raced to his second Sochi Paralympic gold, while Liudmyla Pavlenko added a gold medal to the Ukrainian count with a win in the women’s 12 kilometer cross-country sit-skiing event on Sunday.
Another Ukrainian athlete, Olena Yurkovska, who won bronze in the women’s 6 kilometer sitting biathlon on March 8, said she “devotes her first medal in Sochi to an independent Ukraine.”
Ukraine skiier Yulia Batenkova won the second individual award of the competition, taking silver in the 15 kilometer ski marathon against sportsmen who were competing while standing. Batenkova had led the entire race until the last lap, when she began to lose speed, finishing 3.9 behind the winner, Sweden’s Helen Ripe.
The silver was the second medal for Batenkova at the Sochi Olympics. She already took bronze in the 6 kilometer biathlon race.
