russia))))))) (Photo: @Ovi8)

Four years ago in Vancouver, Alex Ovechkin revealed his specially painted skates for the 2010 Winter Games. They featured his number eight painted and a demonic sheep. The sheep we later learned was a nod to the Ovechkin family name: ‘Ovechka’ means “sheep” in Russian.

For Sochi, Ovechkin’s skates are a little less gaudy and a thousand times more patriotic. In a tweet last night, Ovi debuted his new skates, which feature the Russian flag ever-so-subtly painted across the side of the boot. His signature yellow laces (not gold…) are there as well.

Russia lines: Ovechkin-Malkin-Semin, Radulouv-Svitov-Kovalchuk (No Datsyuk for practice, he was in the team picture).

— Corey Masisak (@cmasisak22) February 10, 2014

You’ll see those bad boys on the first line of Team Russia, next to Evgeni Malkin and Alex Semin.

And here are the Vancouver 2010 skates: