On a bitterly cold, snow-covered Boxing Day in Dnipro, I met one of Ukraine’s true national icons: Yaroslava Maguchikh, a world and Olympic record holder in the high jump. It was a quiet meeting, far from stadium lights and podiums, but in many ways it carried more meaning than any medal ceremony.
Athletics in Ukraine has not escaped the effects of Russia’s full-scale invasion. Training schedules are dictated by air-raid sirens and the availability of safe spaces. The war has damaged or destroyed nearly 800 sports facilities across the country — including stadiums, arenas, and Olympic training bases — leaving hundreds of key training hubs unusable.
Equally devastating are the human losses. Official Ukrainian figures show that around 590 athletes and coaches have been killed since the start of the invasion, with others missing, held in captivity, or serving on the front lines. For many athletes, especially children and young people, simply accessing a safe place to train has become a daily challenge. The psychological toll of loss within sporting communities is profound.
And yet, Ukrainian athletics has not collapsed. It has adapted.
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Coaches improvise sessions between alerts. Athletes train outdoors in freezing conditions or in borrowed facilities. Many young competitors carry trauma that would normally end sporting careers before they even begin. Still, Ukraine continues to produce world-class performances. That resilience is not accidental — it reflects a broader national refusal to surrender identity, culture, or ambition.
© Shaun Pinner
This context matters when discussing the continued ban on Russian and Belarusian athletes from international competition. The issue is often framed as “sport and politics,” but that framing misses the point entirely. Sport is built on fairness, safety, and respect for human life. Allowing athletes to represent a state actively waging a war of aggression, while Ukrainian athletes train under missile threat, would hollow out those values. How could that ever be considered fair?
The ban is not revenge. It is accountability. It prevents international sport from becoming a propaganda platform and recognises that so-called neutrality, in this context, would amount to complicity. For Ukrainian athletes, the decision carries symbolic weight: the world is not asking them to compete as if nothing is happening.
Nowhere is the importance of that recognition clearer than among Ukraine’s children.
An entire generation is growing up with war as its baseline reality. Many have lost homes, family members, coaches, and teammates. When sport survives, it offers structure, discipline, and a sense of normal life. But inspiration matters just as much as infrastructure.
That is why meetings between elite athletes and young people are so powerful.
© Shaun Pinner
When a child meets Yaroslava Maguchikh, they are not just meeting a champion. They are meeting proof that success is still possible from Ukraine, for Ukraine. She is not an abstract figure on television; she is someone who speaks their language, understands their fear, and carries the same national burden. A handshake, a photograph, or a few quiet words of encouragement can have a deeper psychological impact than any speech or funding programme.
Yaroslava’s achievements are not separate from the war, they are shaped by it. Every competition she enters is a reminder that Ukraine still stands, still competes, and still wins. By showing up for the next generation, especially in frontline-adjacent cities like Dnipro, she helps rebuild belief where it is most fragile.
Athletics in Ukraine today is not just about records and results. It is about resilience, values, and continuity. In a country fighting for its future, heroes who stand with children are not simply champions of sport, they are the guardians of hope.
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