San Francisco Frontiers - Ukrainian skeleton racer Heraskevych loses appeal against Olympic ban

In the biggest controversy of the Milan-Cortina Games so far, Heraskevych was barred from his event on Thursday after refusing to ditch the helmet that features pictures of Ukrainian sportsmen and women killed since Russian forces invaded in 2022.

Gestures of a political nature during competition are forbidden under the Olympic charter.

Heraskevych, 27, took his case to the Court of Arbitration for Sport sitting in Milan on Friday, telling reporters: "I hope truth will prevail and still I know that I was innocent."

But CAS, sport's top court, said it had denied Heraskevych's appeal "against the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC)".

CAS secretary general Matthieu Reeb said the court had "found that freedom of expression is guaranteed at the Olympic Games, but not on the field of play, which is a sacred principle".

Reeb added that Annett Rombach, the German arbitrator who examined the appeal, "wished to state that she is fully sympathetic to Mr Heraskevych's commemoration and to his attempt to raise awareness for the grief and devastation suffered by the Ukrainian people, and Ukrainian athletes because of the war".

However, she concluded that Heraskevych's helmet did violate the IOC's Athlete Expression Guidelines.

Heraskevych said his disqualification was "frustrating" as he presented the helmet to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Munich later Friday.

"Nobody was complaining about this helmet, so it was a purely discriminatory decision... and I should be there," he added.

The IOC had tried to find a compromise with Heraskevych, allowing him to wear the helmet in training runs and when talking to the media. It proposed that he wear a black armband in competition, but he refused to back down.

Kirsty Coventry, the IOC president and a former Olympic gold medallist in swimming, met with Heraskevych, who was one of Ukraine's flag bearers in the opening ceremony, early on Thursday in an unsuccessful attempt to persuade him to change his mind.

"My conversation with Vlad and his dad yesterday was a very good conversation, a very respectful conversation and you know, it was a time really for me and him to speak as athletes," Coventry said on Friday.

"That was really important for me and I think for him, and I shared with him yesterday how the process went."

But on the issue of political messages, "the rules are the rules as they stand today", Coventry said.

M.Hill--SFF