Russian President Dmitry Medvedev awarded state decorations to Russian athletes on Monday for their achievements at the Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
The Vancouver Games were Russia's worst since czarist times, with the team winning just three gold medals, five silver and seven bronze, and finishing 11th in the overall medals table. The Kremlin has been appalled by Russia's "dismal" performance, calling on officials responsible for the preparation of Russia's Olympic team to quit.
Russian Olympic Committee head Leonid Tyagachev resigned on March 3, two days after Medvedev said senior sports officials should quit over the country's poor showing at the Winter Olympics.
"Many of our young athletes have shown that our Olympic team has a high potential," Medvedev said at the state awards ceremony for the Russian Olympic team in Moscow.
He also noted Russia's surprising success in snowboard and skeleton.
"This is very important to us. It was proven by snowboarder Yekaterina Ilyukhina who won Russia's first ever silver Olympic medal in this kind of sport, and Alexander Tretyakov, who grabbed the bronze medal in skeleton," Medvedev said.
The Order of Friendship was awarded to skiers Nikita Kryukov, Evgeny Ustyugov and biathletes Svetlana Sleptsova, Anna Bogaliy-Titovets, Olga Medvedtseva and Olga Zaitseva, who grabbed the gold medals. Zaitseva also won silver in Biathlon women's 12.5 km mass start.
The Order of Merit for the Motherland was awarded to silver-winning figure skater Evgeni Plushenko, speed skater Ivan Skobrev, who took silver and bronze, and biathlete Ivan Cherezov, who grabbed the Olympic bronze.
The Order of Merit for the Fatherland, second class, was awarded to the bobsleigh pair of Alexei Voevoda and Alexander Zubkov, who won bronze medals, figure skaters Oksana Domnina and Maxim Shabalin, who took bronze, silver-winning snowboarder Yekaterina Ilyukhina, skiers Irina Khazova, Natalia Korosteleva, who grabbed the bronze, skiers Nikolay Morilov and Alexei Petukhov, who also took bronze medals, skier Alexander Panzhinsky, who won the silver medal, Alexander Tretyakov, who won bronze in skeleton, and biathletes Maxim Chudov and Anton Shipulin, who grabbed the Olympic bronze in the men's 4x7.5km biathlon relay together with Ivan Cherezov and Evgeny Ustyugov.
Medvedev signed the decree awarding state decorations to Russian athletes shortly after the end of the Olympics, in an effort to break away from tradition which saw the 2008 Beijing Olympics team receive their well-deserved awards only after almost a year delay.
"I think that this is a reasonable decision that ... all the decorations be awarded ten days after the end of the Olympic Games. This is proper because the memories are still fresh in our minds," Medvedev said.
"You went out and you did your best," he added, addressing the athletes.
The Russian government will pay the medalists a ruble equivalent of 100,000 euros for every gold medal, 60,000 euros for every silver medal, and 40,000 euros for every bronze medal. Each medalist will also receive an Audi car and Omega watch.
MOSCOW, March 15 (RIA Novosti)
