Andrii Tkachuk reports to his friends and acquaintances with a picture on Facebook: The gaunt face looks straight into the camera.

The eyes seem small from tiredness.

You saw war.

A Ukrainian flag adorns the shoulder of the thickly lined uniform.

Combat helmet and several ammo magazines are attached to the tactical vest.

The fingers press the AK 74 firmly against the chest.

Alexander Davydov

sports editor.

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The comment below the picture is cynical and obstinate: “If you want to look like a warrior, but you're actually a small 300.” 300. In Ukrainian military jargon, this means wounded: “Shards of shrapnel in the left shoulder and right forearm.

Doctors will leave 'gifts' from the 'brothers' with me for now.” It's the seventh of March and Tkachuk is experiencing another day.

Three weeks earlier, he was still part of a completely different world: Tkachuk was considered one of the best ultra runners in his homeland, a specialist in extreme routes and distances.

Now the world around him has gone to extremes: the media reports daily of bombings on civilian targets, housing blocks and hospitals being destroyed.

Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians are fleeing.

But Tkachuk decides to defend his homeland.

"First came reconnaissance drones..."

But now he has been being treated in a hospital in the south of the country for three days and is awaiting surgery soon.

The 36-year-old sneaks out of his room, dials a number in Germany and begins to talk: about the war directly at the front.

Tkachuk tells that he took part in the fighting south of the city of Zaporizhia.

"Our unit faced a war machine of overwhelming superiority that day," he says, while the hum of medical equipment drowns out his voice in the background.

“First the reconnaissance drones came, then the attack helicopters worked on us, later the artillery fire started with 120-millimeter cannons.

A classic of the genre.

Then more helicopters.” Tkachuks sounds calm and matter-of-fact as he describes events in detail – more like reading a situation report than evoking fresh memories of the war.

But the end of the battle, he says, will be heralded in the evening when the heavy tanks finally advance.

“Our positions had taken heavy fire.

We retreated.

I think I was one of the last ones to see it.

I have to say, I only saw that in the old WWII movies, when a whole house is suddenly blown up completely by a hit,” says Tkachuck.

Shortly before the battle, civilians are said to have stayed there, and the Ukrainian soldiers had urged them to leave.

Tkachuk doesn't know whether the residents made it out of their homes in time.

According to his own statements, he barely escaped with his life when a projectile hit him a little later.

Splinters in the arm and shoulder

"We took up positions again and were just waiting for the enemy to advance," he says.

“Besides me, it must have been about ten meters, three guys took up positions.

We were shot at, I was wounded and noticed that the comrades to my right were properly covered.

There was one with a broken leg.

He was the only one injured.

The other two had it worse in the face and body.

Holes in everything.”