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Ineos Grenadiers’ Russian pro Pavel Sivakov denounces invasion of Ukraine

24-year-old says that most Russians “only want peace” and that “we shouldn’t be targets of hate just because of our origin”, as UCI faces calls to sanction the Gazprom-RusVelo team

Ineos Grenadiers' promising Russian rider Pavel Sivakov took to Twitter last night to denounce his country’s invasion of Ukraine, while also calling on others to distance the actions of President Vladimir Putin from the views of the majority of Russians.

Sivakov, who has long been touted as a future grand tour winner after finishing ninth at the Giro d’Italia on his first attempt in 2019, wrote: “It’s been a difficult few days seeing what’s currently happening. First of all I just want to say that I’m totally against the war and can’t get around of what’s going on in Ukraine, all my thoughts are with the Ukrainian people.”

The Ineos rider is the son of two former elite Russian cyclists, Alexei Sivakov and Aleksandra Koliaseva, and was born in Italy and raised in France. In his post, the 24-year-old addressed the popular view of the invasion in Russia, where thousands have joined anti-war protests across the country, leading to almost 2,000 arrests.

“I also want people to understand that most of the Russians only want peace and never asked for all of this to happen,” he wrote. “We shouldn’t be targets of hate just because of our origin. I know these few lines won’t make a big difference to the current situation but I just wanted to share it. Peace.”

With Ukraine’s capital Kyiv currently under attack from Russian forces, much of the sporting world has united to condemn Putin’s decision to launch a full-scale invasion of his southern neighbour.

Yesterday, European football’s governing body UEFA announced that the 2022 Champions League final, due to be held in May, has been moved from St Petersburg to Paris, while Formula One has cancelled this year’s Russian Grand Prix in Sochi, after leading drivers such as Sebastian Vettel called for a boycott of the race.

The cycling world was also forced to address the war yesterday after Gazprom-RusVelo’s 19-year-old Czech rider Mathias Vacek won the penultimate stage of the UAE Tour from a breakaway, the first professional victory of his career.

Gazprom is the largest supplier of natural gas in the world and is majority-owned by the Russian state. It has sponsored the Russian RusVelo ProTeam since 2016, when the team won a stage of the Giro d’Italia through Alexander Foliforov.

German football club Schalke 04, which has been sponsored by Gazprom since 2007, said on Thursday that it would remove the Russian company’s logo from its shirts. UEFA is also considering ending its €40m a year deal with Gazprom, the title sponsor of its flagship Champions League for the past decade. 

Following Vacek’s win in the UAE, members of the cycling media called on the UCI to address the gas supplier’s role in the sport. Jeremy Whittle, author of Ventoux and Bad Blood, tweeted yesterday that the UCI and its president David Lappartient “should — if their thoughts are with the Ukrainian people — act now to sanction the Gazprom team, which directly promotes the activities of the Russian state and its oligarchs. Other sports federations are, as usual, well ahead of cycling on this.” 

Cycling writer Herbie Sykes also wrote: “Gazprom should be booted out immediately. The riders and staff should be given a new jersey. They should be retained and bankrolled by UCI until a new sponsor can be found.” 

Yesterday the UCI released a statement condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which breaches the Olympic Truce, and called for a peaceful solution to the conflict “through diplomatic channels”.

However, cycling’s governing body stopped short of promising any sort of concrete action against Russia, only incorrectly clarifying that “no UCI event is scheduled to take place in Russia or Belarus in 2022” [Two track meets in Moscow and St Petersburg, due to take place in May, are currently listed on the UCI’s website as sanctioned Class 2 events, while June’s Five Rings of Moscow stage race is a 2.2 ranked event]. 

After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.

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55 comments

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Rich_cb replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
0 likes

I thought you were going to ignore me Rendel?

Never mind, It was enjoyable while it lasted.

I'm not going to resurrect the previous thread on here but I did leave a little explainer on there for the 'hard of thinking'.

Have a read, see if you can figure out why both those quoted statements might be correct...

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chrisonabike replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
3 likes

Thanks but I think we've all had enough sheep recently ... in many ways.

EDIT - being fair, same comment to Rendel. My wooly mind has no more space for  ovine-emission-related debate.

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mdavidford replied to chrisonabike | 2 years ago
3 likes

I agree with Nick Chris.

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
1 like

I make exceptions when you show such stinking moronic supercilious hypocrisy. Honestly, you really do need to learn that whilst the Internet is an excellent learning resource, especially for the "hard of thinking" like yourself who could clearly do with all the learning they can get, cutting and pasting from it does not actually make you the expert in virtually every subject under the sun you appear to think it does.

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Rich_cb replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
1 like

You've missed an opportunity to educate yourself there Rendel.

Never mind.

Please go back to ignoring me now. I did prefer that.

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
2 likes

No, I shall not be bothering trying to debate anything with you - because as we know, in Richworld only one person can ever be right, however many people prove him wrong - but I shall continue to point out your hypocrisy, arrogance and ignorance when I have time. Sorry about that, I know you like your internet C&P to be treated as gospel and for everyone simply to acknowledge your "expertise". I can't do it for every example of course, that would be a full time job.

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Rich_cb replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
0 likes

I actually quite enjoy making a fool out of you Rendel.

Debating a wealthy white Londoner with a ludicrous sense of entitlement can be tedious at times but watching you slink off tail between your legs time after time after time is really quite cathartic.

If you're just going to insult me and not engage in debate though... Wouldn't that just make you a troll?

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
2 likes

Ah bless, sorry if you feel insulted when your hypocrisy, ignorance and stupidity is pointed out. Perhaps try being less hypocritical, ignorant and stupid?

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Rich_cb replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
0 likes
Rendel Harris wrote:

Ah bless, sorry if you feel insulted when your hypocrisy, ignorance and stupidity is pointed out. Perhaps try being less hypocritical, ignorant and stupid?

I think you'll enjoy this one.

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
1 like

duplicate for some reason

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
2 likes
Rich_cb wrote:

 I think you'll enjoy this one.

I absolutely do as it's a tremendous exemplar of your utter hypocrisy, in the last hour you've attacked me personally for my ethnicity, my place of birth and residence, and my supposed wealth (God knows where you got that bullshit from, I wish you were right). I take it you are tacitly acknowledging your lack of any argument?

P.S. I did not grow up in West London, nor have I ever lived there.

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Rich_cb replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
0 likes

Not an attack Rendel, just pointing out the many facets of your privilege.

The immensely privileged Left Wing Londoner is a bit of an amusing stereotype after all.

Anyway, please leave me alone.

I'm growing tired of your obsession now.

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Sniffer replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
1 like
Rich_cb wrote:

I'm growing tired of your obsession now.

Rich, I suggest that ‘obsession’ might apply to you too.

Careful with the company you keep. Just remember the theory of ‘your enemy’s enemy is your friend’ is not very attractive.

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Rich_cb replied to Sniffer | 2 years ago
0 likes

Take a look at who instigated this interaction.

You can check other threads too

I will not be responding to any of his nonsense anymore so it will soon be pretty clear who the obsessive is.

I've got no problem interacting with Nige, we disagree on a lot of things but he's polite to me and our discussions are always civil.

I actually like hearing from people with very different opinions to my own, challenges me to justify those opinions.

Live and let live.

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Sniffer replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
1 like
Rich_cb wrote:

I've got no problem interacting with Nige, we disagree on a lot of things but he's polite to me and our discussions are always civil.

Nigel uses you for cover on his 'trolling mission' You are being used, wake up.

On the other matters, I didn't say you were solely to blame, just look in the mirror please.

You couldn't even answer me without a 'Mum, he started it'.

The reason I point this out is that we have managed to have interesting discussions in the past without necessarily agreeing. While our views are often different you do sometimes give me something to think about.

On this thread you may have let yourself down.

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Rich_cb replied to Sniffer | 2 years ago
0 likes
Sniffer wrote:

On this thread you may have let yourself down.

This has not been my finest hour, I agree.
Hence the lack of interaction from now on.

If Nige is capable of civil and interesting interactions with me then maybe others can try my approach?

Engage when interested, don't engage if not.

Works for me.

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Sniffer replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
2 likes
Rich_cb wrote:

I actually quite enjoy making a fool out of you Rendel.

You may make yourself look a bit foolish too in the process though.

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Rich_cb replied to Sniffer | 2 years ago
0 likes

Maybe.

Worth it to take him down a peg or two though.

He's led such a privileged sheltered little life he can't even handle basic disagreement.

Très amusant it is.

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chrisonabike replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
2 likes
Rich_cb wrote:

Maybe. Worth it to take him down a peg or two though. He's led such a privileged sheltered little life he can't even handle basic disagreement. Très amusant it is.

Ooh - is it going to be like the Yorkshireman sketch now between the pair of you? Will he just send the Thatcher quote straight back?

I've forgotten what this thread was about now anyway so that's something...

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Rich_cb replied to chrisonabike | 2 years ago
0 likes

That would be amusing!

I look forward to Rendel's tale of immense hardship growing up in leafy West London.

Hopefully he'll just go back to leaving me alone though.

I did prefer that.

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Rich_cb replied to Lance ꜱtrongarm | 2 years ago
0 likes

It's certainly possible

There's definitely something at the root of his unpleasantness.

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
3 likes
Rich_cb wrote:

It's certainly possible There's definitely something at the root of his unpleasantness.

It's splendid that the only person you can get to back you up is an alt-right Trump fanboy fantasist cyclist hater who has used (at least) six different aliases on this website and been banned numerous times. If a man is judged by the company he keeps, boy are you in trouble.

 

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Rich_cb replied to Rendel Harris | 2 years ago
0 likes

Goodbye Rendel.

I'm happy to engage in genuine debate but any future posts that are just insulting or pointless (see above) will be ignored.

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Rendel Harris replied to Rich_cb | 2 years ago
2 likes

You mean like your ones attacking someone for their ethnicity and place of birth/residence? Suits me if you don't respond little man, it won't stop me calling you on your unpleasant rightist lies as they arise though.

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Wingguy replied to Nikolai | 2 years ago
2 likes
Nikolai wrote:

Russian athletes are in a difficult position, but if they want to compete, they must, as individuals, renounce the actions of the Kremlin.

The 'Great loyalty oath crusade' section of Catch 22 covers this quite well. When you mandate that state a certain position, the statements become meaningless.

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