Yuriy Kozlovsky devoted 20 years to military service. During the ATO in 2016, he was wounded and lost his leg. After recovery, he returned to sports.
Recently, he took part in a 42-kilometer marathon in Tokyo to help his fellow soldier raise money for treatment. Yuriy Kozlovsky says that he had been preparing for the marathon for about four months together with his fellow prosthetic limb, Roman Kashpur.
“The standard training regimen looked like this: a week in the gym and running two or three times a week. I ran at least 10 kilometers. Closer to the marathon, I stopped going to the gym and tried to run about 14-15 kilometers three times a week,” says Yuriy.
Yuriy covered the distance on the prosthesis in 7 hours.
“The support from both our Ukrainian community and the Japanese was incredible. It was extremely gratifying to see that when you run with the Ukrainian flag, wearing Ukrainian national symbols, fans and runners expressed their support for Ukraine with shouts of “Glory to Ukraine” and “Glory to Ukraine” and comments that we support you,” the marathoner says.
Yuriy says he took part in the marathon to help raise money for his fellow soldier, Denys, call sign “Ajax,” for a neurostimulator.
“The amount we had to raise was over 300 thousand hryvnias, and we managed to raise about 1.2 million yen. In fact, we covered Denys’s surgery, and in addition, there are funds left over that will be spent on other people who need treatment,” says the veteran.
He adds that he was hesitant to participate in the marathon, but his wife, border guard Tetiana, supported him. She was by his side the whole time.
“This is his victory over himself, because running such distances is difficult. And since we have a lot of wounded, a lot of young guys, I would like them to see that there is life after injury, and it is quite active,” says Tatiana Kozlovska.
We would like to add that the Tokyo Marathon is one of the most prestigious marathons in the world – the World Marathon Majors series. This year, the Ukrainian team was supported by the Citizen Charitable Foundation, which took care of all the arrangements for the trip.