Vadim Gutzeit

Vadym Gutzeit (; also Vadym Guttsayt; born 6 October 1971) is a Ukrainian Olympic champion sabre fencer, and former Ukraine's Youth and Sport Minister, as well as the president of the Ukrainian Fencing Federation and the President of the National Olympic Committee of Ukraine.

He was world junior sabre champion in 1989 and 1990, fenced in three Olympic Games, was sabre team Olympic champion in 1992, won a bronze medal in the 1991 World Fencing Championships, and was the 2005 Maccabiah Games sabre champion. Since March 2020, Gutzeit has been Ukraine's Youth and Sport Minister. He has been an international referee for the Fédération Internationale d'Escrime (FIE) since 2002. Gutzeit was inducted into the Hall of Fame of the FIE in 2013.

Early and personal life Gutzeit was born in Kyiv In 1993–2002, he served as a major in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

He is married to Ukrainian journalist, radio and TV presenter, Oksana Gutzeit. They have two children. He won the Ukrainian national sabre championship when he was 15. He fenced for Dynamo (Kiev).

Gutzeit won the gold medal in the Junior Under-20 Sabre World Fencing Championships in both 1989 and 1990. In 1991, he won a silver medal in the same event.

That year he also won an individual bronze medal, and a Unified Team silver medal, in sabre at the 1991 senior World Fencing Championships.

Olympic champion Gutzeit is an Olympic champion, and has competed in three Olympics. He competed in the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona for the Unified Team (the former Soviet Union) at the age of 20, and won a gold medal with the sabre team.

He also competed in the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, this time for Ukraine, finishing 6th in the individual sabre event after being defeated 14–15 in the quarter-finals by Russia's Stanislav Pozdnyakov, who eventually won the competition. Gutzeit took part in his third Olympiad at the 2000 Sydney Games, for Ukraine. Seeded No. 13, he lost 10–15 in the table of 16 to 1998 world champion Domonkos Ferjancsik of Hungary. In the sabre team competition, he and Ukraine finished 6th. He also competed in the 2001 Maccabiah Games in Israel, and won the silver medal in individual sabre.

Coach, referee, and official From 2002 to 2010, Gutzeit was the head coach of Ukraine's fencing team, which won an Olympic gold medal in women's team sabre in 2008. He has since officiated in a number of major competitions, including the 2000, 2004, 2012, and 2021 Olympics.

In 2010-2020, Gutzeit was the executive director of the Ukrainian Olympic Training and Sports Center.

On 9 June 2019 Gutzeit announced he would take part in the July 2019 Ukrainian parliamentary election with the party Servant of the People. Three days later, however, he withdrew from the election.

Ukrainian Youth and Sports Minister On 4 March 2020, Gutzeit was voted in as Ukraine's Youth and Sport Minister.

On 28 February 2022, referring to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, he wrote: "No one has the right to threaten our sovereignty and freedom... Sport carries the idea of peace. But if the enemy is on our land – ... We will surely win!"

Referring to the International Olympic Committee's decision to reinstate Russian athletes as neutrals, Gutzeit pointed out in March 2023 that "neither us nor them" are satisfied with the decision, with the Ukrainians ardently demanding a blanket ban, while the Russians claim the IOC criteria is humiliating, hypocritical, and russophobic.

Also in March 2023, Gutzeit said that Russia's invasion of Ukraine had so far killed 262 Ukrainian athletes, and destroyed 363 sports facilities in Ukraine.

In 2023, Gutzeit, who had competed with Russian Olympic Committee president Stanislav Pozdnyakov when they were teammates from Ukraine and Russia on the post-Soviet Unified Team at the 1992 Olympics, said he had only contempt for Pozdnyakov. He blames Pozdnyakov for vocally supporting Russia's invasion of Ukraine. 243 Ukrainian MP's voted for his dismissal.