Russia wins first Paralympic gold of 2026

Varvara Voronchikhina won the Super-G as Russia returned to the Paralympics under its national flag for the first time in ten years

Alpine skier Varvara Voronchikhina won the women’s Super‑G title on Monday at the 2026 Paralympics in Italy, giving Russia its first gold medal of the Games as the country made a symbolic return to competition under its own flag.

The 2026 Paralympics mark the first time since 2014 that Russian athletes have competed under their national flag following a decade of restrictions and bans from international Paralympic competition.

The Super‑G, or super‑giant slalom, is an alpine skiing discipline that blends elements of traditional downhill speed with giant slalom’s more technical turning, demanding both precision and high velocity from competitors.

Voronchikhina’s victory continued to her successful Paralympic campaign as she’d already won a bronze medal in the downhill event, her first Paralympic podium.

Another Russian alpine standout, Aleksey Bugaev, took bronze in the men’s downhill standing event, adding to Russia’s early medal haul.

The Russian Paralympic team was cleared to compete earlier this year after Moscow won an appeal in the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) against the International Ski and Snowboard Federation. The body had barred athletes from Russia and Belarus despite the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) fully reinstating athletes from both nations last year.

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Many Russian athletes were banned from competing after a World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) investigation in 2015, following allegations of state-sponsored doping – which Moscow has consistently denied. Dozens of the bans were later overturned on appeal at the CAS, which said there had been insufficient evidence to impose sanctions.

The Milano‑Cortina 2026 Paralympic Winter Games opened on Friday in Verona and are scheduled to run through March 15, with six Russian athletes competing across alpine skiing and snowboarding events.