Paris Paralympics 2024: Sharad Kumar was coached to high jump silver by man caught behind battle lines of Ukraine war

When Indian long jumper Sharad Kumar won a silver medal at the Paris Paralympics in the T63 category on Tuesday, there was a Ukrainian war connection to his medal. For, Sharad Kumar’s coach Nikitin Yevhen has been holed up in the Ukrainian city of Kharkiv from where he has been helping the two-time Paralympic medallist for over two years now.

Sharad Kumar cleared the bar set at a height of 1.88m in the final of the T63 high jump event at the Paris 2024 Paralympics on Tuesday. The 32-year-old lost out on the gold medal to USA’s Ezra Frech, who cleared 1.94m and set a new Paralympics record. The bronze medal was won by India’s Mariyappan Thangavelu, who leapt over the bar placed at 1.85m. The T63 classification is for athletes with single through knee or above knee limb deficiency.

The silver at Paris 2024 was Sharad Kumar’s second Paralympic medal after his bronze medal at the Tokyo 2020 games with a clearance of 1.83m three years ago. On Tuesday night, the Indian contingent crossed the 19-medal record that it had set at the Tokyo Games three years ago.

After claiming his silver, Sharad Kumar revealed to journalists that his medal had made his Ukrainian coach Yevhen emotional back home in Kharkiv, the second largest city of Ukraine. Kharkiv is about 500km from capital Kyiv, but has faced massive bombardment over the years as the country had fought a bitter war with neighbours Russia.

“He (Nikitin Yevhen) sent me a voice note from Ukraine after my medal. He was almost in tears,” Sharad Kumar revealed after winning the silver medal.

“The Russia-Ukraine war has impacted me immensely, because my coach has not been able to be with me ever since the war broke out. I trained for the Paralympics in the Philippines and he coached me online. It’s been very, very difficult. He’s old, he cannot move around too much. He is the only one in the house because his kids are in the war. So it’s a difficult situation. His guidance is always there with me. I’m in touch with him every day.”

Sharad Kumar had trained under Yevhen in Kharkiv from 2017 till just before winning a high jump bronze in Tokyo Paralympics in 2021.

Back in February 2022, Sharad Kumar had posted an update on Instagram about his coach: “Just spoke to my coach in Ukraine’s Kharkiv, he is worried, he can hear bombing from his room, he is planning to move to his garage underground. I hope the matter is resolved soon.”

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