Sean Ingle
The Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych has been disqualified from the Winter Olympics after he refused to back down from wearing a “helmet of memory” in honour of Ukraine’s war dead.
The decision was announced by the International Olympic Committee just 21 minutes before the first round of the men’s skeleton competition in Cortina on Thursday after last-ditch talks between the IOC president, Kirsty Coventry, and Heraskevych failed to find a breakthrough.
Key events
It looks like gold for Ferderica Brignone in the Women’s Super G, which will move Italy up to second place in the medal table. Ten athletes are yet to ski, 13 have not finished.
It would be sensational comeback for Brigone, who fractured her leg last April and was out of action for nearly 300 days.
Finland ski jump coach sent home after breaching booze rules
Sean Ingle
The Finnish ski jumping head coach Igor Medved has apologised after being sent home for violating team rules by drinking alcohol at the Winter Olympics.
The news was confirmed by the Finnish Olympic committee, who said that Medved had left Italy due to “alcohol-related issues”.
“Medved has travelled home today,” said Janne Hänninen, head of elite sports at the Finnish Olympic Committee. “This is about alcohol-related issues. We take rule violations very seriously and will act quickly in the matter.”
Hänninen refused to go into further details about Medved’s behaviour, which the Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet has described as a “drunkeness scandal”. However he added: “The priority is to ensure peace of mind for the athletes and the coaching staff.”
A history of previous IOC rule violations by athletes
There have been a number of incidents over the years where athletes protested on the field of play or on the medals podium.
The most famous case dates back to the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City when U.S. sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos raised black-gloved fists during the 200 metres medal ceremony to protest racial injustice in the U.S. That led to their expulsion from the Games, although Smith kept his gold medal and Carlos his bronze.
More recently, at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics, Afghan breakdancer Manizha Talash, a member of the refugee Olympic team, was disqualified after wearing a cape with the slogan “Free Afghan Women” during a pre-qualifying competition.
However, there have also been cases where athletes and teams escaped punishment when their action was not deemed political.
Australia’s women’s soccer team unfurled a flag of the first peoples of Australia at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 but, while not one of the recognised flags of participating nations at the Games, the team were not sanctioned.
Two Chinese cycling medallists who wore badges featuring the head of their country’s former leader Mao Zedong on the Tokyo Olympics podium escaped with a warning. Reuters
Super G: Watching so many athletes crash out before you, must affect the nerves of the waiting skiers … as another one goes out, the USA’s Mary Pocock. She sprays into the air over the roller and flips awkwardly on the snow. An air bag inflates to rescue her yet, somehow, she is able to stand up and walk away.
Super G: Quiet falls over the crowd as Breezy Johnson, the women’s Olympic downhill champion, becomes the next athlete not to finish, crashing soon after the start. She hooks one of the gates, loses balance and slams into some side netting. Thankfully, she seems to be ok.
Super G: Back on the slopes, the very first skier to set off, Italy’s Federica Brigone, is still on top. Although some of her fellow medal contenders have skied off course, there are plenty of big names still to come.
Skeleton: … Weston plummets down the track, chin just above the ice, and finishes with a 0.30sec lead going into the second day. He gives his coach a huge hug and pumps the air. His teammate Marcus Wyatt sits in seventh place.
Skeleton: With just Matt Weston to go it’s a German one-two: the silver medallist from four years ago, Axel Jungk, just ahead of Christopher Grotheer. Weston needs a new track record to stay in first. Here he comes with a sprint on to his sled …
Skeleton: Great Britain’s Marcus Wyatt has a smooth descent into (temporary) first place, but his lead is only 0.01 seconds, with the top six still to come.
Super G: They’re falling like ninepins in the mountains, first Germany’s Emma Aicher, then the Czech Republic’s Ester Ledecka, who has a nasty fall, but manages to pick herself up and reach the bottom. And now Sofia Goggia – who hurtles down the slopes but goes out on the same gate as Aicher. Six have so far not finished.
Women’s Super G: In the mountains, the Women’s Super G. It’s hazy at the top, the athletes launching themselves through the mist on to an unfamiliar course before hurtling down at whistle-stop speed.
Ah no, Germany’s Kira Weidle-Winkelmann makes a mistake and skies off the course. And so does the next athlete, Austria’s Mirjam Puchner.
Because the athletes haven’t had a chance to ski the course, there is a real disadvantage to going early.
At the sliding centre, the USA’s Austin Florian zips down on his tin tray into first place – but with 13 sliders still to come, and sliding in reverse order of results in heat one.
A quick catch up on sporting events this morning:
Men’s moguls: Ikuma Horishima of Japan, who won bronze in Beijing, is top of the qualifiers in the men’s moguls, with 85.42 points. Two Canadiens, Julien Viel (79.56) and Mikael Kingsbury (79.11) lie in silver and bronze. Team GB’s Mateo Jeannesson was knocked out at the qualifying stage, finishing 30th, frustrated by a flaring heel injury.
Men’s snowboard cross: France’s Aidan Chollet is top of the pops in the first seeding run. Britain’s Huw Nightingale was 10th fastest and automatically qualifies for the knockout stage.
Heat two of the luge is under way, Britain’s Matt Weston, in pole position, will slide last.
Medal events
Women’s Super G 11.30am GMT
Men’s moguls 12.15pm GMT
Women’s cross-country 10km interval 1pm GMT
Men’s cross snowboard 2.56pm GMT
Women’s speed skating 5000m 4.30pm GMT
Mixed luge team relay 6.30pm GMT
Womens half pipe 7.30pm GMT
Women’s speed skating 500m short track 9.35pm GMT
Men’s speed skating 1000m short track 9.48pm GMT
A devastated Vladyslav Heraskevych has been talking to reporters in the mixed zone.
“[I am feeling] Emptiness. Yesterday was amazing at training. I could be among the medallists in this event but because of some interpretation of the rules which I don’t agree with I am not able to compete…rememberance is not a violation of the rules.”
In the BBC studio, Lizzie Yarnold is still working through her thoughts. “Not being able to compete in your childhood dream just minutes before, and having your accreditation taken away so you won’t be allowed to support your fellow athletes. We are part of a community, so I think I’m just left with a real sense of sadness and real surprise.”
Away from events at Cortina for a moment, there are nine golds waiting to be hung around necks today, on the ice, the snow, the half pipe and down the stomach-churning sliding centre.
Mid-morning, we have the blue riband Women’s Super G, where Mexico’s 46 year old Sarah Schleper, skies for middle aged women everywhere.
A little later, Japan’s Horishima Ikuma is the man to beat in the men’s moguls finals, while there is another medal up for grabs in the women’s cross-country skiing at 1pm. Anna Pryce goes for Team GB.
Two finals then unroll in the snowboarding – the men’s cross and the women’s half-pipe, where Chloe Kim is the huge favourite to win her third successive gold under lights this evening.
The chaotic team relay in the luge – women’s singles, men’s singles, women’s doubles and men’s doubles – starts at 6.30pm GMT.
And then the women’s 5000m speed skating at 4.30pm GMT, before two evening finals in the short track speed skating, women’s 500m and men’s 1000m, close the day.
The skeleton event, in which Heraskevych was supposed to have been racing, is well under way at the Cortina Sliding Centre. After run one, Britain’s Matt Weston is currently in the lead, with Britain’s Marcus Wyatt in seventh.
Run two starts at 10.08am GMT, with the final tomorrow.
BBC commentator, and two-time Olympic bobsleigher, John Jackson, was asked about his view on Heraskevych:
“For me, being military and now a veteran, remembrance is really important to all veterans,” he said. “We have all lost friends and colleagues in conflict and we all know someone who isn’t here and paid the ultimate sacrifice.
“I support him in what he was trying to achieve. It is really important to remember those who have given their life for something that ultimately doesn’t need to happen.”
IOC president Kirsty Coventry was in tears speaking to the media after the decision to disqualify Heraskevych. “This is price of our dignity,” Heraskevych posted on X shortly after his meeting with Coventry.
The Kyiv-based artist Irina Protz, who has known Heraskevych since he was a child, decorated his helmet of memory, which showed 24 athletes killed in the Russian war.
“The world is becoming more apathetic every day,” she has said. “That is why I took on this work to remind the world that we had athletes who could have been here.”
The skeleton event, in which Heraskevych was a medal contender, is under way without him.
Sean Ingle
The Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych has been disqualified from the Winter Olympics after he refused to back down from wearing a “helmet of memory” in honour of Ukraine’s war dead.
The decision was announced by the International Olympic Committee just 21 minutes before the first round of the men’s skeleton competition in Cortina on Thursday after last-ditch talks between the IOC president, Kirsty Coventry, and Heraskevych failed to find a breakthrough.
Lizzy Yarnold, who won skeleton gold for Team GB in 2014 and 2018, is on pundit duty for the BBC and was asked about the decision to expel Heraskevych from the Olympics.
“He’s had his accreditation taken away, which means he needs to leave the Games … This is the wrong decision, and the IOC owe him an apology.”
Heraskevych on ban: ‘It’s emptiness’
From the Associated Press:
International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry was waiting for Heraskevych at the top of the track when he arrived at around 8.15am Thursday, or roughly 75 minutes before the start of the men’s skeleton race.
They went into a private area and spoke briefly, and Coventry was unable to change Heraskevych’s mind. He was holding the decision from the International Bobsled and Skeleton Federation when he briefly addressed reporters and said he would appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport.
“It’s hard to say or put into words. It’s emptiness,” he said. Coventry spoke with reporters after the meeting, tears rolling down her face as she spoke. “It’s a message of memory and no one is disagreeing with that,” Coventry said. The IOC added that it made its decision “with regret.”
Heraskevych kicked out of skeleton for memorial
Good morning and welcome to our daily live coverage from Milano Cortina.
Some breaking news: The Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych is out of the Games after refusing a last-minute plea from the International Olympic Committee to use a helmet other than the one that honours athletes killed in the war with Russia.
We’ll have more details soon on that and the rest of day six’s action, where nine golds are up for grabs.
