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The Klitschko brothers had been introduced up by their mom Nadezhda and their father Vladimir, a proud Soviet man who rose to turn into a high-ranking navy officer. It was a job which afforded his two sons Vitali and Wladimir their high-quality schooling, and instilled a disciplined streak which sowed the seeds of a boxing dynasty. It’s a unusual accident, then, that the brothers ought to now be drawn right into a bloody battle in opposition to Russia, the nation their father devoted his life to.
Vladimir ultimately gave his life for Russia, too. He was a USSR navy commander at a close-by airbase when the Chernobyl energy plant exploded on 26 April 1986, and he was one of many first on the scene. He repeatedly travelled into the catastrophe zone serving to to organise the clean-up operation with little understanding of the risks, whereas his spouse and younger sons had been solely 60 miles away. Vladimir died from lymph node most cancers aged 64, which medical doctors linked to his publicity to radiation. A decade on from their father’s demise, the Klitschko brothers are actually taking on arms after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “I don’t have one other alternative, I’ve to do this, I’ll be combating,” the 50-year-old Vitali, now mayor of Kyiv, stated on Friday.
They grew up with robust navy affect and below the impression the USA might unleash catastrophic battle at any second. Youthful brother Wladimir informed Grantland in 2011: “Once I was 12 I used to be taking pictures AK-47s, dealing with hand grenades, operating by means of underground tunnels, training drills, and finding out get together with tank assaults.”
They took up fight sports activities from an early age: Vitali competed in boxing, kickboxing and karate with nice success in all three, whereas Wladimir started his boxing coaching in Brovary on the outskirts of Kyiv earlier than shifting to Warsaw to work with higher coaches. Aged 17 he grew to become the heavyweight Junior European Champion, and two years later his older brother Vitali gained gold on the 1996 Navy World Video games in Rome.
That yr Vitali additionally graduated from college and started his postgraduate course which might earn him a PhD in sports activities science; Wladimir achieved the identical qualification, incomes them the boxing nicknames Dr Steelhammer and Dr Ironfist.
Two glittering boxing careers adopted as they launched into an period of dominance for greater than a decade from the flip of the century (they saved a promise to their mom by no means to battle one another). Vitali grew to become a heavyweight world champion in 1999 however famously misplaced to Lennox Lewis in Los Angeles in 2003, one in all solely two defeats; regardless of a protracted profession spanning three many years, Vitali was by no means as soon as knocked down. Wladimir first grew to become world champion in 2000 and later unified the division earlier than a string of profitable title defences, earlier than ultimately succumbing to Tyson Fury in Germany in 2015.
Out of the ring, Wladimir started a relationship with diminutive American actress Hayden Panettiere, creating an eye catching peak distinction between the 6ft 6in boxer and the 5ft star of NBC present Heroes. The pair, who’ve a daughter collectively, grew to become engaged earlier than separating in 2018. Vitali married Russian mannequin and tennis participant Natalia Egorova, and so they have three kids who’ve grown up realizing solely a free, impartial Kyiv.
Vitali moved into politics close to the top of his boxing profession, first as advisor to president Viktor Yushenko and later as mayor of the capital. Each brothers had been distinguished within the 2013 Euromaiden protests, the general public backlash after president Viktor Yanukovych refused to signal a cope with the European Union and as an alternative selected nearer ties with Russian president Vladimir Putin. Yanukovych was overthrown and Putin has resented the lack of an ally main Ukraine ever since.
“My entire life I used to be informed that the US was a horrible nation,” Vitali informed Grantland. “Sooner or later, I at all times believed, I must defend my house nation in opposition to loopy People who needed to manage the entire world.” The Klitschkos are actually defending their house nation, however it’s the nation their father proudly fought for that they battle to withstand.
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