Our budget is many times smaller than that of our competitors, but we defeat them – Hraskevych.

Ukrainian skeletonist Vladyslav Hraskevych compared the budgets of Ukraine and competing countries in an interview with the publication 'Glavkom'.

At the last World Championship, Hraskevych managed to defeat athletes from Austria, Germany, Great Britain, and China.

In Great Britain, they spent a lot of money on the development of skeletons. The team employs engineers who previously worked at Formula-1 McLaren and collaborate with universities. I don't remember the exact amount, but I am sure it is more than a million pounds a year, possibly even closer to two. Just for skeleton, without bobsleigh. As for the Chinese teams... We surpassed all representatives from China at this World Championship. And, if I'm not mistaken, they allocated over 1.5 million euros annually for the team.'

Hraskevych noted that Germany also invests heavily in skeleton.

In Germany, there is a separate institute that produces everything necessary for skeleton athletes, including the skeletons themselves. They have many sports bases, starting ramps... But they only have four ice tracks. Therefore, it is impossible to compare with their budgets.'

The athlete emphasized that countries with tracks for skeletons have a significant advantage.

Take Austria, for example. They already have a great advantage. Children start to ride skeletons from the age of 4-6 years. This is how both Samuel Meyer and Janine Flock, who are now the strongest representatives of Austria in the World Cup, started training. In Ukraine, we do not have such conditions.'

The budget of the Ukrainian Federation of Bobsleigh and Skeleton is just under 400,000 dollars.

Hraskevych emphasized that the Ukrainian budget is significantly smaller compared to the budgets of competitors, and the training conditions also differ.

Additionally, Hraskevych expressed his opinion on the change of citizenship by gymnast Ilya Kovtun and his coach Iryna Horbacheva, noting that they received significant support from the state budget.