Ukrainian arm wrestlers fined after protest during Russian anthem in Budapest

Dmytro Lutsyshyn and Leonid Sidorchuk turned a gold-medal ceremony into a disciplinary case in Budapest, where each Ukrainian para-armwrestler was fined €250 after leaving the podium during the Russian anthem. The punishment came under the European Armwrestling Federation’s awards regulations and put the sport’s neutrality rules under a brighter spotlight than any medal count.

The incident unfolded at the 28th European Para-Armwrestling Championship, staged alongside the 35th European Armwrestling Championships in Budapest from May 8 to 20, 2026. More than 1,300 athletes from 34 countries took part, making it the largest European edition on record, and the pressure around every ceremony was obvious long before the anthem controversy broke open.

According to reporting, Russian competitor Andrey Gavrilov had just won gold when the Russian anthem was played, despite his neutral athlete status. Lutsyshyn and Sidorchuk stepped down from the podium in protest, and the move was immediately treated as a violation rather than a gesture. One account identified Lutsyshyn as a Zhytomyr native and an international-class master of sports, while the athletes said their protest was tied to Russia’s war against Ukraine.

The penalties did not stop at the fine. Reporting also said the two Ukrainians were sent for doping control and issued a warning after the ceremony, a sequence that shows how quickly a podium protest can spill beyond symbolism and into the sport’s policing machinery. That matters in para-armwrestling, where credibility is built not just on match results but on whether federations can enforce rules without appearing to flatten the political reality around them.

The larger question now is what the EAF and tournament organizers will do next. If Russian athletes are allowed to compete under neutral status, but an anthem still enters the ceremony script, Budapest has exposed a gap that no one can ignore. Ukrainian athletes still collected 73 medals across the European Armwrestling and Para-Armwrestling Championships, but this episode will linger longer than most podium photos, because it forces the sport to decide how it wants to handle wartime symbols the next time gold is on the line.