Fighting With Heart
Olga Kharlan is indisputably one of the biggest names in fencing, and a hero in Ukraine’s young post soviet sporting world. She’s been Women’s number #1 ranked player across five years and is a four-time individual women’s world sabre champion, and a four-time Olympic medalist.
She’s hoping to add another olympic medal to her wall at the Olympics in Paris currently getting underway. This was almost entirely dashed late last year when she faced off against Russian fencer Anna Smirnova who was competing as an independent neutral athlete at the world championships in Milan. Kharlan handily beat Smirnova 15-7. At the conclusion of the round Smirnova offered her hand, Kharlan instead offered Smirnova the tip of her sabre, pointing it at her before leaving. Kharlan stayed sitting in a chair in protest of the black card move for 50 minutes.
The black card applied to Kharlan would mean her chances of getting to the Olympics would be entirely scuttled as she would no longer be able to compete for points.
“I did not want to shake hands with this athlete, and I acted with my heart. So when I heard that they wanted to disqualify me it killed me so much that I was screaming in pain.” she said on Instagram.
The International Fencing Federation later reversed its decision. But if that wasn’t enough The International Olympic Committee (IOC) sent a special invitation in case this speed bump meant she couldn’t gather the points.
The president of the IOC, Thomas Bach reached out. “As a fellow fencer, it is impossible for me to imagine how you feel at this moment,” he said. “The war against your country, the suffering of the people in Ukraine … all this is a roller coaster of emotions and feelings. It is admirable how you are managing this incredibly difficult situation, and I would like to express my full support for you.”
Sometimes the weight of the world is truly on your shoulders, and the weight of it can crush even the most egalitarian ideals of sportsmanship. Sometimes all you have left is your heart.
