Banned over a helmet, Olympian receives $200K from Ukraine's wealthiest billionaire: 'A true winner'

Ukraine's wealthiest person, billionaire Rinat Akhmetov recently donated more than $200K to the country's skeleton racer, Vladyslav Heraskevych who was banned from the 2026 Winter Olympics.

The athlete was ousted from participating in the competition due to the controversial helmet that he donned to 'honour' Ukrainian sportsmen and women who had died during the Russia-Ukraine war.

Titled as 'helmet of remembrance' the helmet had images of 24 Ukrainian athletes who had been killed since Russia invaded the country in 2022, including late teenage weightlifter Alina Perehudova, boxer Pavlo Ischenko, ice hockey player Oleksiy Loginov, actor and athlete Ivan Kononenko, diver and coach Mykyta Kozubenko, shooter Oleksiy Habarov and dancer Daria Kurdel, and more.

After the 27-year-old refused to take it off, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) banned him on the grounds that he did not 'comply with the IOC's Guidelines on Athlete Expression'.

Heraskevych, who was the country's flag bearer had trained in the helmet for days at the Games before being told that he couldn't use it in the competition. He appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport against the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation jury’s rule that he had breached the athletes’ expression at the Games. However, he lost his case just hours before the final two runs of his competition.

Then came Akhmetov, owner of Ukrainian football club, Shakhtar Donetsk, who acknowledged the athlete's patriotism for their country and declared him 'a true winner' despite not having participated in the games being held in Milan and Cortina, Italy. Interestingly, the money donated to Heraskevych is equivalent to what Ukraine pays to athletes who score a gold medal in the Olympics.

“Vlad Heraskevych was denied the opportunity to compete for victory at the Olympic Games, yet he returns to Ukraine a true winner,” Rinat Akhmetov, the club’s president, said in a club statement.

“The respect and pride he has earned among Ukrainians through his actions are the highest reward. At the same time, I want him to have enough energy and resources to continue his sporting career, as well as to fight for truth, freedom and the remembrance of those who gave their lives for Ukraine.”

According to IOC spokesperson Mark Adams, the helmet was against Rule 50.2 of the Olympic charter, which states that there shall be 'no kind of demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas'.

“The IOC fully understands the desire of athletes to remember friends and colleagues who have lost their lives in that conflict, and in many, many other difficult conflicts around the world,” Adams said in a press conference in Milan on February 10.

“It's fundamental that there are equal rights for all athletes and that the games need to be separated not just from political and religious, but from all types of interference so that all the athletes competing can concentrate on their performance. What we said is that this helmet contravenes the guidelines.

"But that being said, after the meeting, we also reiterated once again that we will in this case, as we do now more often, make an exception to the guidelines to allow him to wear a black armband during competition.”

Ever since, the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine war, a report by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) estimates that close to 600,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed, wounded or gone missing. The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) verified a total of 55,600 civilian casualties during Russia's invasion of Ukraine as of December 31, 2025.