On February 28, 2018, Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Russian Olympic medalists. This took place in the Kremlin and is a tradition for Russian medal winners. The winners were awarded orders and medals. Also, as is tradition, in the Russian Federation, they were also awarded luxury cars and prize money.
Olympic Medalists Get Prize Money And New Cars
This year, the government awarded prize money for each of the Olympic medal levels. The gold medal warrants $65,000, for silver $40,000, for the bronze medal $28 000 (funds in USD). In addition to the cash prizes, for the last 12 years, the Russian Olympians Foundation has been buying luxury cars for medalists.
“It is the tradition of the Russian Olympians Foundation to present cars of prestigious brands as gifts to winners of Olympic Games,” said the Fund’s executive director, Alexander Katushev.
By awarding the athletes with prized cars, the Russian Olympians Foundation wants to say “Thank you!” to the athletes. Winning medals is an honour. However, the foundation would like to recognize them for the hard work, they do, for the results they achieve, and for placing the country on the Olympic podium.
The Tradition Started in Turin
It started in 2006. Following the results of the Winter Olympic Games in Turin, medalists were awarded luxury cars. Ladies were presented with Lexus models and men with Land Cruiser models.
After the Summer Olympics in Beijing, there were BMW SUVs.
The Winter Olympics in Vancouver made the athletes, who won medals owners of Audi SUVs.
And after the Summer Olympics in London – there were 129 black Audi sedans as prizes. Gold medal winners received Audi A8s, which sold new for $120,000, Silver medalists got an A7 ($75,000), and bronze medalists got A6s ($50,000).
The medalists of the Games-2014 in Sochi were given Mercedes SUVs. The model range was GL, ML and GLK.
As the Rio 2016 was over, there were BMW models awarded to athletes. Gold medalists received BMW X6 models, silver medalists received BMW X4 and bronze medalists drove away with BMW X3 models.
White BMW models for this year
In 2018 the prized cars are BMW models. This year, the models were the same as they were in 2016: winners of bronze medals were presented with BMW X4 models, silver medals the BMW X5, and gold medals the BMW X6.
Additionally, for the first time in 26 years, the gold was won by the national hockey team of Russia, playing as O.A.R. This led to a larger amount of the most expensive models of the lot to give away.
The Board of Trustees
The Board of Trustees of the Foundation for the Support of the Russian Olympians is headed by Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. Also, the council includes officials, functionaries, and businessmen. Among which are Roman Abramovich, Alisher Usmanov, Vladimir Lisin, Viktor Vekselberg, Vagit Alekperov and others. The fund is a non-profit charitable organization and from August 2016 it is relieved from taxation.
