Olympic skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych has returned home to Ukraine and shared plans to raise funds for the families of the athletes and coaches depicted on the helmet that got him disqualified from the Milan Cortina Games.

The Ukrainian luge relay team showed solidarity with skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych, barred from competing for wearing a helmet honoring Ukrainian athletes killed in the conflict with Russia.

Skeleton slider Vladyslav Heraskevych late on Monday said he had returned to Ukraine after being excluded from the Olympic competitions. In a video posted on X, the 27-year-old appeared to record himself in darkness in central Kiev.

The topic has become a debate during the 2026 Milan Cortina Games amid the conflicts involving Russia and Israel.

Ukrainian businessman Rinat Akhmetov — the owner of the Shakhtar Donetsk soccer club and the Azovstal steel works in Mariupol — gave the money to Heraskevych from his charity foundation. The amount is equal to what the country’s Olympic gold medalists would get.

Vladyslav Heraskevych's "helmet of remembrance" was banned by the IOC, with the Ukrainian losing a subsequent appeal to CAS.

Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych was disqualified from competition last week because he insisted upon wearing a commemorative helmet, which honors more than 20 athletes and coaches from Ukraine who died during Russia's invasion,

Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych will not competeafter refusing a last-minute plea from the IOC to use a helmet other than the one that honors more than 20 of his country's athletes and coaches killed in the war with Russia.

Vladysav Heraskevych, the Ukrainian skeleton racer disqualified from over his remembrance helmet, has received his country's Order of Freedom.