Nothing is the same this Christmas for Ukrainian skeletoni Vladyslaw Heraskevych. Russia’s invasion of his country has changed his life too. He’s not at the front, he’s fighting for his homeland from outside. He is disturbed by an idea from the IOC.
It didn’t take much for Vladyslaw Heraskevych to alarm the world. On February 11, after his third run in the Olympic skeleton race in Beijing, he held up a white sign that read “No War in Ukraine.” The “New York Times” described the protest, tolerated by the IOC as a call for peace, as a “central moment” of the games, but it didn’t help anything: 13 days later Russia attacked Ukraine. “I could not believe it.”
Since then, “Wlady” Heraskewych has gone to bed tired every day. Tired because he spends hours on his cell phone or sitting in front of his laptop to organize help for Ukraine. He has set up his own foundation and it is very important to him to help children with sports and these days with Christmas presents. “I go to bed thinking,” he says, “that I want to do my best – and if I’ve helped just one child today, then I’ve made their world a better place.”
Heraskevych knows that he is still lucky. He’ll be 24 soon, but they didn’t draft him into the military. The army told him he should rather help Ukraine in his own way. So he does what is in his power – these days from a holiday apartment in Schönau am Koenigssee. Friends provided them. He lives there with his father Mykhailo. The mother, the girlfriend – they are further in Kyiv. “I’m worried,” says Wlady.
Together with toboggan Olympic champion Felix Loch and the “Athletes for Ukraine” association, Heraskewytsch organized a sports afternoon for children last Wednesday at the Berchtesgaden Olympic base. His foundation also organizes these offers in Ukraine. With sport he can bring back a piece of the “lost childhood” to children, he says. And then, like on Wednesday with Ukrainian refugees, “you see the happiness in their eyes, and that’s wonderful.”
It is all the more difficult for Heraskevych to understand that the IOC is discussing allowing Russian and Belarusian athletes to take part in the 2024 games in Paris. He gives Russian athletes credit for being “brainwashed,” for not knowing what they’re doing. Still, “We shouldn’t give them the opportunity to promote the war” as they do. “Athletes are ambassadors of Olympic values,” he emphasizes, meaning: for peace.
Heraskewytsch’s incomprehension is all the greater when he talks about this war and its consequences in an emotionally charged voice. “Yes,” he says, “Russian athletes can’t take part in competitions,” but that’s out of all proportion. “Ukrainian athletes can’t even live in their homes,” and, even worse, “Ukrainian athletes can’t compete because they lost their lives.” More than 200 are already dead.
Heraskewytsch pursues his own sporting career on the side. He finished 18th at the Olympics, he has just returned from the World Cup in Lake Placid, where he came 12th – he also organized donations and relief supplies there, driven by the news and videos from Ukraine. “It’s bad,” he says, the people have “no home, no electricity, no work, people are dying, businesses are dying – it’s a disaster.”
But: Heraskewytsch doesn’t give up – because those he helps don’t do it either. “People still have hope,” he reports, “they believe that everything will be fine.” He himself finds “hardly any words … how can people be so optimistic?”. Yes how? “These are the Ukrainians,” and especially the support from all over the world, “motivates the Ukrainians to stay strong – so I too have hope that everything will be fine.”
Heraskewytsch will spend Christmas with Felix Loch, his dedicated wife Lisa and their three children. “Felix is ??a role model,” he says, so it’s “a great honor for me. I’m very happy.” But then he will immediately do everything in his power to ensure that others have a smile on their faces again.