From the FasterSkier archive — posts syndicated from athletes’ and coaches’ own blogs between 2004 and 2012, kept online as published. Current coverage is at fasterskier.com.
IBU World Cup in Canmore. (Photo: canmorebiathlon.ca screenshot)
Canmore, Canada IBU World Cup 4 x 7.5 k/ 4 x 6 k relay
Friday in Canmore was team relay day. Norway’s Lars Helge Birkeland, Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen,Erlend Øvereng Bjøntegaard and Johannes Thingnes Bø won the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay in 1:16:36.6 hours while acquiring no penalties on the shooting range and using seven spares.
In second place was France’s Antonin Guigonnat, Emilien Jacquelin, Simon Fourcade, and Quentin Fillon Maillet. The French team finished 1:10.4 minutes back with no penalties while using eight spares.
Russia took the third podium position with Evgeniy Garanichev, Eduard Latypov, Alexander Loginov, and Alexander Povarnitsyn. With no penalties and using nine spares, the Russians crossed the finish line 1:48.4 minutes back.
Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Jules Burnotte, and Brendan Green racing for Canada all began in bib 18 as the 18th ranked team and hopped eight positions in the final standings to finish 10th (+4:53.2). In total, Canada had two penalties while using 18 spares. It was also the final race of Green’s career.
The U.S. team of Sean Doherty, Leif Nordgren, Max Durtschi, and Travis Cooper was lapped and not given an official time. Doherty skied the first leg and tagged off 41.4 seconds behind first-place France. Nordgren raced second and tagged Durtschi with a 2:49.7 minute deficit. Durtschi was lapped on his third and final ski loop after shooting 3+3 and 2+3.
The women’s 4 x 6 k relay Vanessa Hinz, Franziska Hildebrand, Denise Herrmann, and Laura Dahlmeier took the win in 1:10:16.3 hours. The German foursome had a total of one penalty lap while using 12 spares.
Emille Aagheim Kalkenberg, Ingrid Landmark Tandervold, Tiril Eckhoff, and Marte Olsbu Roeiseland raced to second place, 30.2 seconds back. Kalkenberg used all her spares and skied two penalty laps to put the Norwegians in an early hole. On the next three legs, Norway used four spares total to pull themselves back into contention.
Anais Chevalier, Justine Braisaz, Anais Bescond, and Julia Simon racing for France placed third (+41.6, 0+12).
The U.S women took eighth overall, finishing 3:58.4 minutes behind. Susan Dunklee, Clare Egan, Joanne Reid, and Emily Dreissigacker had two penalties while using 12 spares during the race.
For Canada, Sarah Beaudry, Emma Lunder, Megan Bankes, and Rosanna Crawford For Canada, Sarah Beaudry, Emma Lunder, Megan Bankes, and Rosanna Crawford placed 18th. The Canadians were lapped on the final ski loop of the second leg.
Tomorrow’s scheduled sprints for both the men and women have been postponed to Sunday die to predicted cold temperatures.
The men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay in Ruhpolding, Germany. (Photo: screenshot biathlonworld.com)
IBU World Cup Ruhpolding, Germany 4 x 7.5 k / 4 x 6 k Relay
In relatively calm weather on Friday in Ruhpolding, Germany the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup sent the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay on its way. Under overcast skies, a slight 5 mph wind and temps trying to break freezing saw Norway’s team of Lars Helge Birkeland, Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen,Tarjei Bø, and Johannes Thingnes Bø win in 1:09:54.3 hours. The Norwegian foursome raced to the top podium spot with no penalties and using eight spares.
The move that grasped the race for Norway came when Johannes Thingnes Bø, on the final leg, threw down a speedy attack on the course’s burliest hill making him the carrot the others would be chasing towards the finish line. In less than a kilometer, Bø put in the almost 14 second gap back to Germany
Germany’s Rees Roman, Johannes Kuehn, Arnd Peiffer, and Doll Benedikt placed second 13.5 seconds behind Norway. Rees shot clean for Germany as did Peiffer – in total the German team shot with no penalties and used six spares.
The final podium spot went to France’s Emilien Jacquelin, Martin Fourcade, Quentin Fillon Maillet, and Simon Desthieux. France finished 26.2 seconds back while skiing no penalties and using nine spares.
Canada’s Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Aidan Miller, and Jules Burnotte skied to 16th 3:49.0 minutes behind Norway. In total, the Canadians skied one penalty and used 16 spares.
The U.S. team of Leif Nordgren, Sean Doherty, Jake Brown, and Max Durtschi raced to 17th, stopping the clock 4:01.2 after Norway. Over the duration of their four legs, the U.S. skied a single penalty lap while using 13 spares.
Twenty seven teams were entered in the men’s race.
The Canadian selection races for senior World Championships combined with a NorAm and Québec Cup weekend hosted by the Mont Orford club, began with freestyle sprints today.
Maya MacIsaac-Jones (CNST) won the qualifier and all her heats on the way to winning the A final, leaving no doubt about her selection for Seefeld. MacIsaac-Jones’ 2:36.83 minute A final was the fastest lap of the day, just edging 4th fastest qualifier Katherine Stewart-Jones (CNST) by 0.05 seconds. Laura Leclair (CNEPH) was third at 3.77 seconds after qualifying second. Third-place qualifier Cendrine Browne (CNST) was fourth, 4.99 seconds back, with Zoë Williams (Nakkertok) fifth (+5.18) and U.S. skier Madison Morgan sixth (+8.92.)
On the men’s side, Evan Palmer-Charrette (Team R.A.D.) won the A final in 3:06.58 minutes, 0.11 seconds ahead of Julien Locke (CNST). Top qualifier Russell Kennedy (Team R.A.D.) was third, 2.26 behind Palmer-Charrette and 0.24 seconds ahead of Sebastien Boehmler-Dandurand (AWCA). Antoine Briand (Skibec) finished sixth (+5.12), followed by Dominique Moncion-Groulx (Nakkertok) in sixth (+5.93).
Racing continues for two more days with an interval start classic on Saturday and mass start skate on Sunday. The top Canadian each day qualifies for World Championships.
Snow dump — during the 2018 15 k classic pursuit in Lillehammer, Norway. Emil Iversen (bib 3) holds off the charging pack to take third. (Photo: Fischer/Nordic Focus)
FIS Cross-Country World Cup in Lillehammer Norway: 10 k/ 15 k Classic Pursuit
On Sunday, the third and final day of racing in Lillehammer, Norway concluded with a 10-kilometer classic pursuit for the women.
A win is a win, and Norway’s Therese Johaug, took the day and her second victory in as many days when she crossed the line first in 29:35.5 minutes. Sweden’s Ebba Andersson finished second (+16.8), Norway’s Ingvild Flugstad Østberg third (+17.9).
The day’s first starter, Charlotte Kalla, trailed off to finish in fourth (+23.1). Kalla began with a small gap of 2.5 seconds on Johaug. The third starter, Andersson, began 14.5 seconds back.
Sadie Bjornsen of the U.S. Ski Team (USST) ended her day in 10th (+2:21.7), while teammate Jessie Diggins was 13th (+2:42.4). Rosie Brennan (APU) in a strong comeback to the World Cup placed 15th (+2:46.0).
Caitlin Patterson (CGRP), who earned a 30th place on Saturday, fell back slightly, ending up 34th (+5:13.1). Kailtlynn Miller (CGRP) finished in 50th (+7:43.9).
The men’s 15 k classic pursuit featured an off-the-front dual between the day’s first two starters, Sjur Røthe and Didrik Tønseth. The two Norwegians started only 1.8 seconds apart. By 5 k, they had gapped third place starter, Norway’s Emil Iversen by 35.2 seconds. (Iversen had been 11.5 seconds back at the start.)
The Røthe-Tønseth engine continued to pull away from the field to gain over a minute by the finish. Tønseth won in a time of 44:13.8, Røthe crossed the line 1.8 seconds back.
Iversen placed third (+1:03.3), a whisker ahead of a charging pack with over thirty skiers. Sweden’s Calle Halfvarsson was fourth (+1:04.4).
Canada’s Alex Harvey was the best placed North American in 16th (+1:08.7). Also for Canada, Russell Kennedy (Team R.A.D.) was 61st (+4:32.4), and Andy Shields 71st (+6:06.7)
Also for the U.S., David Norris (APU) skied to 52nd (+3:21.9), Kevin Bolger (USST) 59th (+4:20.8), Adam Martin (CGRP) 62nd (+4:35.7), Scott Patterson (USST) 63rd (+4:39.0), Simi Hamilton 66th (+4:44.1).
SuperTour, West Yellowstone, Mont.: 15 k / 10k Freestyle
Back on the high plateau’s of West Yellowstone, the SuperTour held day two of it’s Montana stop. The men raced a 15-kilometer freestyle — 3 times around a 5 k loop.
Craftsbury Green Racing Project’s (CGRP) Ben Lustgarten took the win in a squeaker over Kyle Bratrud who skis for SMS T2. Lustgarten won in time of 36:42.2 minutes, Bratrud stopped the clock 3.5 seconds back. It was Lustgarten’s second podium in as many days; on Saturday he placed second in the skate sprint.
Akeo Maifeld-Caruuci (CGRP) placed third, beating out University of New Mexico skier Ricardo Izquierdo-Bernier by 0.4 seconds. Izquierdo-Bernier was third in Saturday’s sprint.
The women’s SuperTour 10 k skate also featured a dual-podium skier from the weekend. Alaska Pacific University’s (APU) Rosie Frankowski won in 27:33.9 minutes. Frankowski placed second in the women’s skate sprint on Saturday. University of Utah skier Guro Jordheim took second (+46.2). APU’s Becca Rorabaugh was third, finishing 1:19.5 minutes back.
Domestic racing continues next weekend with the Sovereign Lake NorAm-SuperTour.
IBU World Cup Pokljka, Slovenia: 2 x 6 k + 2 x 7.5 k Mixed Relay + Single Mixed Relay
In Pokljka, Slovenia, men and women completed a 2 x 6 k + 2 x 7.5 k mixed relay. Placing first was Team France with Anais Bescond, Justine Braisaz, Martin Fourcade, and Simon Desthieux who completed the course in a total time of 1:10:02.8 with a team shooting score of (0+5). In the first leg, Bescond had two penalties (0+2 0+0). Following Bescond, was Braisaz with one miss (0+1 0+0). Fourcade raced the third lap, shooting 100 percent. Desthieux closed out for France in first after two misses (0+0 0+2).
Sunday’s second place went to Switzerland’s team of Elisa Gasparin, Lena Haecki, Benjamin Weger, and Jeremy Finello. The team finished 38.7 seconds back from France with a total team shooting score of (0+9). Gasparin raced the first leg, missing a total of three shots (0+1 0+2). Gasparin handed off to Haecki who also missed three shots (0+0 0+3). Weger, who skied the third leg, shot clean and Finello, who raced the last leg, had three misses (0+1 0+2).
The third team to finish on Sunday was Italy’s Lisa Vittozzi, Dorothea Wierer, Dominik Windisch, and Lukas Hofer. Italy finished 52.1 seconds behind France with a team total shooting score of (1+8). Vittozzi shot clean, while Wierer, who raced the second leg, missed two shots (0+2 0+0). In the third leg, Windisch skied six penalties (1+3 0+2), while Hofer closed out the fourth leg with one miss (0+0 0+1).
Team Canada finished in 10th (+2:33.2), with Rosanna Crawford racing the first lap and missing one (0+1 0+0). Megan Tandy tied Crawford’s score racing the second lap. In the third lap was Nathan Smith who cleaned, while Scott Gow also shot 100 percent in lap four.
The US Biathlon team of Susan Dunklee, Clare Egan, Leif Nordgren, and Sean Doherty finished in 15th (+4:19.8). Dunklee led the team off with two misses (0+1 0+1) while Egan followed in leg two with three misses (0+3 0+0). Nordgren took leg three with one miss, while Doherty skied three penalties (0+2 0+1) to close out the fourth leg.
In the single mixed relay – teams consist of a single male and female athlete – Norway’s Thekla Brun-Lie and Lars Helge Birkeland won in a total time of 38:26.7 minutes. Norway used only four spare rounds on its way to the win.
Austria’s Lisa Theresa Hauser and Eder Simon placed second, using five spare rounds, finishing 8.5 seconds back. Ukraine’s Anastaslya Merkushyna and Artem Tyshchenko were third (+20.7), using only a single spare round.
Canada’s Megan Bankes and Christian Gow placed sixth (+37.8) after using 10 spare rounds. The U.S. duo, Joanne Reid and Max Durtschi, were eventually lapped and were not given an official time. Prior to being pulled, Reid has used two spare rounds while shooting. Durtschi struggled with his second shooting bout, using three spares and ultimately skiing three penalty laps.
Norway’s Marit Bjørgen celebrates her overall win in the last race of 2018 World Cup Finals, the 10 k freestyle pursuit, on Sunday in Falun, Sweden. (Photo: Svenska Skidspelen/Instagram)
FIS Cross Country World Cup Finals (Falun, Sweden): 10/15 k freestyle pursuits
In the last women’s race of the World Cup season, U.S. Ski Team members Jessie Diggins and Sadie Bjornsen made it one they’ll remember for a long, long time as Diggins raced to second in the 10-kilometer freestyle pursuit and Bjornsen outlasted two Norwegians for third. The two finished the World Cup Finals mini tour in second and third, respectively, behind Norway’s Marit Bjørgen who won it in 24:18.9 minutes.
Bjørgen started with a 36-second cushion to her Norwegian teammate Ingvild Flugstad Østberg in second. Diggins started third, 41 seconds back, just ahead of Finland’s Krista Pärmäkoski in fourth (+43.0), based on their cumulative performances over the last two days of the mini tour (skate sprint and 10 k classic mass start).
While Østberg, Diggins and Pärmäkoski formed a chase pack, Diggins dropped them in pursuit of Bjørgen on the first lap. The American continued to push the pace throughout the three-lap race, coming within 16.7 seconds of Bjørgen at the finish.
Meanwhile, during the pursuit, a chase group of five, which included Bjornsen, caught Østberg and Pärmäkoski. The group of seven dwindled to three on the last two climbs, where Bjornsen and Norway’s Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen and Ragnhild Haga broke away in a race for third.
The three were even entering the finishing stretch, where Bjornsen then beat them in a final 100-meter push to the line. Bjornsen claimed third (+1:11.5) for her fourth podium of the season and first in a distance skate race. Haga followed in fourth (+1:12.0) and Jacobsen fifth (+1:12.8), while Pärmäkoski placed sixth (+1:16.2), Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla seventh (+1:17.9), Østberg eighth (+1:19.0), Sweden’s Jonna Sundling ninth (+1:30.5) and Ebba Andersson 10th (+1:44.7).
Bjornsen now has five-career individual World Cup podiums to her name, and this is the first in a skate race longer than 5 k.
Diggins clocked the fastest time of day in 23:54.4, while Haga was second-fastest (+10.7) after starting the race in 17th. Bjørgen’s time ranked third, Jacobsen was fourth-fastest and Bjornsen fifth-fastest.
Diggins’s performance elevated her to second in the Overall World Cup standings, just 40 points behind Norway’s Heidi Weng (who placed 18th in the pursuit) in first for the second-straight year. Østberg slipped to third overall, 22 points behind Diggins. In the Distance World Cup, Weng took the title by 63 points over Østberg in second, while Diggins was another 32 points back in third.
Bjornsen ended up sixth in the Overall World Cup and 10th in the distance standings.
Also for the U.S., Caitlin Patterson raced from 46th at the start to 35th (+3:58.4) with the 22nd-fastest time of day, Sophie Caldwell placed 36th (+4:00.7), Kikkan Randall finished her last World Cup race in 43rd (+4:33.3) with the 29th-fastest time, Rosie Frankowski placed 46th (+4:41.3), Liz Stephen 50th (+4:57.2) in her final World Cup race, Kaitlynn Miller 56th (+6:13.8), and Ida Sargent 57th (+7:06.4).
For Canada, Cendrine Browne picked off 10 places to finish 39th (+4:14.4) with 27th-fastest time of day, Emily Nishikawa finished 48th (+4:43.7), Dahria Beatty 54th (+6:04.3), and Zina Kocher 60th (+9:28.4).
The men’s 15 k freestyle and 2018 World Cup Finals podium, with Russia’s Alexander Bolshunov (c) in first, Canada’s Alex Harvey (l) in second and Switzerland’s Dario Cologna (r) in third. (Photo: Svenska Skidspelen/Instagram)
In the men’s 15 k freestyle pursuit that followed, Russia’s Alexander Bolshunov started 38 seconds clear of Norway’s Johannes Høsflot Klæbo in second, and Sweden’s Calle Halfvarsson and Italy’s Federico Pellegrino headed out together another second later in third and fourth, respectively.
Norway’s Martin Johnsrud Sundby started the race in seventh (+53.0), and Switzerland’s Dario Cologna followed in ninth (+56.0), while Canada’s Alex Harvey started 1:16 back in 18th.
While Bolshunov skied the entire race on his own and won the weekend mini tour in 35:03.3, a number of racers battled for second, with Sundby moving into second in the chase pack, ahead of seven others, less than 2 k in. Several skiers found themselves at the front of that group, including Cologna, Halfvarsson, and even Harvey (with Harvey leading the chase at 9.3 k), while the time gap to Bolshunov grew.
With about 2 k to go, the group was down to six. Harvey attempted an attack, but Cologna matched him. Then, on one of the course’s final climbs, Cologna made his move to get a slight gap, but lost his balance slightly on the downhill, allowing Harvey to catch back up.
With one last uphill to go, Harvey was in the driver’s seat in second, Cologna in third and Sundby in fourth. That order held to the finish, with Harvey claiming second, 47.1 seconds behind Bolshunov, Cologna placing third (+47.5) and Sundby fourth (+48.7). Just behind them, Russia’s Maxim Vylegzhanin crossed in fifth (+50.3), ahead of Norway’s Hans Christer Holund in sixth (+51.7), Halfvarsson in seventh (+54.1), and Norway’s Sjur Røthe in eighth (+54.9). Nearly 10 seconds later, Norway’s Niklas Dyrhaug outlunged two Russians for ninth (+1:04.1): Denis Spitsov in 10th (+1:04.2) and Andrey Larkov in 11th (+1:04.3).
Harvey, who finished the season in fourth in both the Overall and Distance World Cup standings, won the time of day in 34:34.3. Holund had the second-fastest course time, 1 second off Harvey’s time, after starting the race in 22nd.
Harvey’s Canadian teammate Devon Kershaw tallied his fifth-straight distance top 30 in 28th (+2:21.9), after starting 27th, and Graeme Killick finished 56th (+4:33). Julien Locke did not start.
For the U.S., Erik Bjornsen clocked the 22nd-fastest time en route to 38th (+3:10.4), after he started 51st. Simi Hamilton improved 10 places to finish 49th (+4:07.8), Scott Patterson and Paddy Caldwell worked together to move up from 72nd and 73rd, respectively, to 58th (+4:41.5) and 59th (+4:41.6), respectively, at the finish. Kevin Bolger placed 60th (+4:43.5) and David Norris 64th (+5:09.8).
While Klæbo slipped from second to 25th in the pursuit (+1:45.8), the Norwegian still won his first Overall World Cup by 119 points over Cologna in second. Sundby placed third, 29 points out of second and 82 points ahead of Harvey.
Cologna claimed the Distance World Cup Crystal Globe by 41 points over Sundby, and Holund reached the Distance World Cup podium in third, 58 points out of second and just 5 points ahead of Harvey in third. France’s Maurice Manificat had been third heading into the final day of racing, but finished the pursuit in 26th (+2:11.9) and dropped to fifth in the final distance rankings.
In her last race of the season, Susan Dunklee returned to the podium. The American started fourth in Sunday’s 10-kilometer pursuit at the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup in Oslo, then made her way into third by the final shooting stage. Dunklee shot 18-for-20 (1+0+1+0) and finished 29.5 seconds behind the winner, Darya Domracheva of Belarus, who missed two targets as well (1+0+1+0) and finished first in 30:37.4. Slovakia’s Anastasiya Kuzmina started the race in first (ahead of Domracheva in second) and ended up second (+9.2) with four penalties (0+2+2+0).
Canada’s Julia Ransom and Rosanna Crawford finished together in 51st and 52nd, respectively, both 4:52.4 out of first. Ransom had four penalties (0+1+1+2) while Crawford missed five (1+3+1+0). Emma Lunder did not finish.
In the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Sunday, Norway’s team of Lars Helge Birkeland, Henrik L’Abee-Lund, Tarjei Bø, and Johannes Thingnes Bø used just three spare rounds to clean eight shooting stages and took the win in 1:13:13.7 hours. Austria finished 50.3 seconds back in second place, with Dominik Landertinger, Felix Leitner, Simon Eder, and Julian Eberhard, with a total of five spares. Russia’s Maxim Tsvetkov, Anton Babikov, DmitryMalyshko, and Anton Shipulin raced to third (+56.9) with just four total spares.
The U.S. men placed seventh (+2:01.5) with eighth spares, after Lowell Bailey put the team in seventh on the first leg. Sean Doherty skied them up to sixth on the second leg, Tim Burke slipped to 10th on the third leg, and Leif Nordgren posted the seventh-fastest anchor leg to put them in seventh at the finish.
Canada placed 16th (+5:42.4) with Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Brendan Green, and Macx Davies. The team had been in 19th at the final exchange, but Davies skied them up to 16th with the 14th-fastest anchor leg. In all, they used 10 spares.
Fredrik Lindström crosses the line first to secure a gold medal for his Swedish teammates in the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Friday to close out biathlon competitions at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Remember when it was a big deal when Sweden won a Biathlon World Cup? The team in bright yellow has made it a habit at the 2018 Winter Olympics, winning their first Olympic relay gold and fourth medal over the last two weeks on Friday — the last biathlon race of the PyeongChang Games.
“It’s dreams coming true at that moment,” Fredrick Lindström, the Swedish men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay anchor said in a post-race press conference on Friday. “It’s my third Olympics and to be on top with these guys feels great. I don’t know what to say.”
Lindström had taken gold in perhaps the most ideal way for an athlete in his position, by heading out on the last 2.5 k loop in first place, almost 41 seconds ahead of anyone else. While he had missed his first shot in the final standing stage of the race, Lindström cleared it with the use of one spare bullet. Meanwhile, his closest challenger for the win — Norway’s Emil Hegle Svendsen, who had followed him into the range and lined up alongside him to shoot — missed his first two targets and went on to miss more, ending up with a penalty lap after using all three spares.
That was the end of gold for Norway and for Svendsen, who was all too familiar with the penalty lane in the closing moments of an Olympic relay. Four years ago in the men’s relay in Sochi, Russia, Svendsen as Norway’s anchor had been in the medal hunt until the final shooting. There, he used all of his spares and still left a target standing, which sent him to the penalty lap. After leading by as much as 20 seconds in the middle of that race, Norway finished fourth.
But as they say, that’s biathlon. And on Friday, it was Sweden’s day and Lindström skiing on his own for a 2.5 k victory loop around the course. But he didn’t slow down. As the 28 year old skated up the final climb, he was greeted by several members of his team bowing up and down in a unison to celebrate the history that was about to be made. Lindström descended down into the stadium, not looking back and still pushing toward the line, before skiing to the sidelines a few meters before the finish to grab a small Swedish flag.
Fredrik Lindström crosses the line first to secure a gold medal for his Swedish teammates in the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Friday to close out biathlon competitions at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
It wasn’t like the oversized French flag Martin Fourcade had been seen waving earlier in the Games, in the pursuit and again in the mixed relay. It was understated, like Sweden’s biathlon team before these Olympics, but he waved it proudly as he crossed the line to a sea of swarming teammates.
Sweden (with Peppe Femling, Jesper Nelin, Sebastian Samuelsson, and Lindström) finished first with a cumulative time of 1:15.16.5 hours and a total of seven spares and zero penalties. Skiing alone and finishing 55.5 seconds behind them, Svendsen crossed the line in second for Norway (with teammates Lars Helge Birkeland, Tarjei Bø, and Johannes Thingnes Bø), after tallying 12 spares and one penalty.
In stark contrast to Lindström’s wide-eyed smile as he finished, Svendsen, 32, who had previously earned bronze in the mass start and silver with Norway’s mixed relay in PyeongChang, hung his head. His teammates met him at the finish and tried to improve his mood, but he was down.
“It was a good battle. We wished each other luck before the start and it was a good fight,” Lindström said of contending with Svendsen for two out of three loops.
Norway’s third-leg skier Johannes Thingnes Bø (1) racing his team into fourth to first in the men’s 4 x 10 k relay at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Johannes Bø had tagged Svendsen in first at the last exchange, 0.4 seconds ahead of Sweden, with Samuelsson handing off to Lindström. In the prone stage that followed, both Lindström and Svendsen cleaned without a miss. They left the range together, more than a minute clear of Germany’s Simon Schempp in third (who had missed three but avoided a penalty three spares). Germany had been 13.7 seconds back at the last exchange.
“Emil had to go first the first loop, I went first the second loop, and on the shooting we were equal until that standing,” Lindström reflected. “I don’t know, I was the lucky man today. I feel proud that I managed that situation and to bring the gold to Sweden.”
Even without gold, Svendsen is the third-most medaled biathlete in Olympic history, according to the International Biathlon Union (IBU). A four-time Olympian, he has eight medals, four of which are gold.
“I think that’s awesome,” Svendsen said when asked about his medal tally at the press conference. “It feels very good and yeah, what can I say? Thank you.”
Finishing more than a minute after Norway and exactly 2:07.1 minutes behind Sweden, Germany (with Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll, Arnd Peiffer, and Schempp) placed third after Schempp incurred a penalty in the final standing stage. While he was still far enough ahead of Austria’s Dominik Landertinger to hang onto bronze, that penalty put Schempp nearly a minute behind Svendsen at the start of his last loop.
While he waved to the crowd as he finished, Schempp later said he wasn’t happy with his performance. The German team accrued 10 spares and three penalties (two of which came in Doll’s second leg).
“I just was disappointed in my race,” Schempp told German broadcaster ARD of his finish-line body language, according to a translation. “But at the end of the day we won the medal. That is the most important thing, that’s what matters, but of course, I can’t be satisfied with my shooting bouts. It was so incredibly gusty … I waited crazily long with my spare shots today because I thought the gusts would be over soon and then I could shoot. But unfortunately that was not the case, so I was on the range forever, losing a lot of time and then still didn’t hit every target. It was like a vicious cycle.”
Lesser and Canada’s Christian Gow Up Front
Sweden had positioned itself for a medal from the gun, with first-leg skier Femling tagging Nelin in fifth, 27.3 seconds back, at the first exchange. Germany’s Lesser had put his team in first on that leg with near-perfect shooting — cleaning prone and using one spare in standing (0+0, 0+1). Lesser tagged Doll 18 seconds ahead of Slovakia in second, which had put itself in contention with a flawless first leg from Matej Kazár. (Slovakia dropped to 15th on the second leg and was lapped on the third leg.)
Canada’s first-leg skier Christian Gow (12) leading the field, including France’s Simon Desthieux and Germany’s Erik Lesser (far l), to the top of a climb in the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Canada attracted some serious TV time when Christian Gow took the lead on the first climb out of the stadium. He went on to hit five targets in a row in prone and left the range in second, 1.2 seconds behind Lesser in first. One loop later, Gow had slipped to eighth and about 20 seconds back when he needed three spares to clean. He ended up tagging his brother and teammate Scott Gow in ninth, about 48 seconds out of first.
“It wasn’t planned, for sure,” Gow, 24, told FasterSkier after about his decision to lead on the first loop. “Right at the top of the first climb, everyone was kind of moving over to the right, staying in kind of two lines, and there’s quite a bit of space there, so I took the opportunity to move up just because I’ve done so many relays where you’re stuck in the middle of the pack. … I saw an opportunity to get to the front — I didn’t think it would be the front — but that’s what ended up happening, and I just did my pace and no one wanted to pass me.
“I’m really happy to have cleaned the prone for sure because it’s great if you can lead it, but if you can’t knock down the targets it doesn’t mean too much,” he continued. “In the standing I’m trying to be a bit easier on myself, just because it’s a new situation to be way up in the front like that and having a great day. I wish I would have held it together a bit better than I did. I think I let the nerves get to me a little bit more than I should of, but a lesson learned and I’m happy with the first two-thirds [of my race].”
Sweden’s Steady Rise
Nelin raced Sweden into second place, 16 seconds behind the Czech Republic in first by the second exchange. He cleaned prone with one spare and avoided a penalty with three spares in standing while Germany’s Doll, who had been skiing alone in first before the standing shooting, dropped to fifth and almost 38 seconds back with two costly penalties.
The Czech Republic’s Michal Šlesingr cleaned standing without a miss to take the lead with one loop to go in the second leg, 6.8 seconds ahead of Austria’s Simon Eder in second. Nelin followed another 8 seconds back in third, and tagged just 0.2 seconds ahead of Austria in the exchange.
The third leg saw Johannes Bø, who had been tagged 31 seconds back in fourth, put Norway in first with a clean prone and a single spare in standing. Samuelsson, who had previously taken silver in the 12.5 k pursuit and placed fourth in the 20 k individual race at these Olympics, put Sweden in a position to win gold, using just one spare to clean prone and shooting without a miss in standing. He latched onto Bø, leading the Norwegian on their final loop and handing off to Lindström just 0.4 seconds behind Norway.
The Swedish men’s gold-medal relay team, with Peppe Femling, Jesper Nelin, Sebastian Samuelsson, and Fredrik Lindström, after winning the last biathlon race of the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Earlier this season, Sweden won the men’s relay at the IBU World Cup in Oberhof, Germany. The order was the same, except Martin Ponsiluoma skied the first leg, rather than Femling. While the win was a big deal for Sweden, it was against a slightly watered-down field, with some of the top biathletes opting to skip the Oberhof World Cup at the start of the new year.
Friday’s victory marked Sweden’s first Olympic relay gold in biathlon after it earned bronze in 1976 in Innsbruck, Austria, and again in 1992 in Albertville, France.
“It means a lot. It’s the first medal for men’s relay team in biathlon for Swede,” Samuelsson said. “Of course we are really satisfied. We did four good races everyone today and we’re super happy.”
U.S. Ties Olympic-Best 6th
While Austria finished Friday’s relay in fourth (+2:52.5), and France placed fifth (+3:26.6), the U.S. men tied its country’s best Olympic relay result in sixth (+3:50.2) with Lowell Bailey, Sean Doherty, Tim Burke, and Leif Nordgren. They had been 10th after Bailey’s first leg, in which he used two spares in each stage, and improved to sixth, then fifth on Doherty’s and Burke’s legs.
Doherty used just one spare in prone and cleaned standing without a miss, leaving the range in sixth and 42 seconds back with one loop to go. He then tagged Burke in sixth, about 54 seconds out of first, and Burke held that position with a flawless prone stage followed by three spares in standing. He picked off one place on his last loop to tag Nordgren in fifth, 1:38.8 minutes back.
The second-leg skier in the U.S. men’s relay, Sean Doherty racing his team into sixth on Friday at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. They went on to finish sixth to tie the best U.S. Olympic relay result. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
“I’m real happy about that,” Doherty, 22 and in his second Olympics, said of his shooting. “I feel like I struggled with the prone earlier on [at these Olympics] and I got that kind of dialed in today, which was nice. Standing was good. I had a little break in the wind and I took full advantage. I shot pretty fast, pretty aggressive, but I hit all five from the clip and that’s what really moved things up.
“We had a few days after the individual [race] to go back to the drawing board, come back to some of the fundamentals of shooting,” Doherty explained. “It’s nice to kind of reinforce that I’m capable of hitting targets and fixing things. When you’re not shooting well, you don’t have to keep not shooting well, if that makes sense.”
Nordgren incurred the team’s only two penalties on his prone stage, but because of the strung-out field, he hung onto sixth, losing time to those ahead of him. He used three more spares in standing but stayed out of the penalty lap, finishing about about 24 seconds behind France in fifth.
“Honestly it is a little disappointing,” Nordgren said after. “I know we were gunning a lot more as a team. I had some mistakes there in prone, too. That hurt a lot since we were right there in contention with some top teams in the world…
“I will say we had amazing skis today so I pushed really hard on the first loop and I think I got a couple seconds on [Austria’s] Landertinger,” Nordgren added. “And then just in prone … I was just getting thrown around by the wind. It is has given me trouble the whole couple weeks here I obviously never quite figured it out.”
In addition to tying the best U.S. relay result at an Olympics (of sixth place in the men’s relay at the 1972 Olympics in Sapporo, Japan), sixth was a big improvement for this team, which placed 16th at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. It was also the best Olympic relay result for Bailey and Burke, after they placed eighth in the 2014 mixed relay and ninth in the 2006 Olympic men’s relay.
Tim Burke (l) on the range during a difficult standing shooting with France’s Martin Fourcade. While Burke cleaned with three spares, Fourcade had to ski a penalty lap in the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Asked whether this was his last Olympic race, Burke said it was.
“Today was a good for me so yeah, I would say yes,” the 36-year-old four-time Olympian said. “Biathlon is a crazy sport; it is so up and down from one race to the next. The emotional rollercoaster is amazing. I am done though.
“It has been my life for so long. It is what I know. It is what I love,” he added. “But it is time for the young guns to step up and take my place.”
Bailey told reporters while the race was still going on that he was glad to finish his Olympic career with a race that didn’t include any penalty laps.
“On a day like today, you saw that France was in the loop, now Germany, so the top nations are in there,” he said. “I cannot tell you how challenging this range is. It is so much different than most of the other ranges we shoot on.
“Every Olympics has been different,” Bailey, also 36 and a four-time Olympian as well as 2017 world champion, reflected of his career. “In Sochi I had my career best with eighth place in the individual, and I will always have that. I will always know what I am capable of. That said, I know what I am capable of and I didn’t reach the bar that I set for myself. But all four Olympics have been honestly an incredible honor to put on Team USA uniform and go out there and compete for my country.
“I know that it’s time to make the next step, to make the next transition,” he continued. “I’m really excited for our future, my family’s future. And I’m really excited for the future of US Biathlon.”
Canada 11th
Canada’s Scott Gow leading American Sean Doherty on the second leg of the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Canada finished the race in 11th (+5:40.3). Scott Gow had brought them up to seventh with perfect shooting on both his stages (0+0, 0+0) and tagged Macx Davies about a minute out of first.
“My race pan today was to really emphasize the wind flags, and if it changes direction don’t be afraid to correct for it,” Scott Gow said. “In standing when I came in, it was quite windy, so I just waited a extra couple of seconds and then started to shoot when I felt like it was calm. It is hard to remember that sometimes because you are in the race mode and you just want to get it over with so you can try and just get back on course, so I was happy with that execution.”
Davies, in his first Olympic race, needed three spares to clean prone and slipped to 10th, then had a penalty in standing to leave the range in 12th with one loop to go. He tagged Canada’s anchor Brendan Green in 13th, 4:29 behind. Green went on to use one spare in each of his shooting stages (0+1, 0+1) to bring the team up to 11th at the finish.
Macx Davies skiing the third leg for Canada’s 4 x 7.5 k men’s relay at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
“It wasn’t a great race for me, but I fought through it and pushed myself so that’s all I can ever really do,” the 25-year-old Davies said. “Coming into this race I was kind of just excited to get an Olympic start. We didn’t know if I was in or not until yesterday morning. Then kind of sitting around today, slowing realizing that it was happening tonight and getting a little bit more nervous and a little bit more excited as it went on. That was exciting.
“Being part of the team, being part of Team Canada, it’s such a great feeling, great atmosphere,” Davies added. “Everyday you see someone do something amazing and that just inspires you to keep pushing yourself and do everything in your power to succeed.”
As for Green, he said it’s safe to say these were his last Olympics.
“I’ve been to three Games now and they’ve all been very unique and special in their own way,” the 31-year-old Green said. “I think Korea did a great job hosting. Volunteers are spectacular and so friendly. It’s too bad the weather didn’t cooperate a little bit more, but we did our best We all fought hard and I think we’ll be going away motivated and looking forward to more.”
What’s Next?
While the IBU World Cup season resumes March 8-11 in Kontiolahti, Finland, then makes its next stop in Oslo, Norway, March 15-18, both the Canadian and U.S. teams have stated they will boycott the season-ending World Cup in Tyumen, Russia, March 22-25.
“The latest decision by the IBU was to send the World Cup tour to Tyumen, Russia for our World Cup final,” Bailey said on Friday. “Team USA is boycotting. The Czech team is boycotting. Canada is boycotting. We are trying to rally more support. I know that as an [IBU] athletes’ rep, we had almost every country had athletes that wrote letters to the IBU saying that we do not want to go to Tyumen. We don’t think it’s the right thing for clean sport, and still, the executive board with Anders Besseberg at the helm decided that it was in their best interest to go to Tyumen. So it’s time for a change. IBU leadership needs to change. Besseberg needs to step down. He’s lost the trust of the athletes.”
“We won’t go to Russia,” Green said. “Instead we’ll go back to Canada for nationals. … I think until Russia is compliant we’ll probably continue to take a hard stance until things change.”
Fredrik Lindström of Sweden crosses the line after securing a gold medal for his Swedish teammates in the men’s relay to close out biathlon competitions at the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Germany were the favorites coming into this men’s relay and Erik Lesser started them off with a near-perfect relay leg to sit in first place, but shooting collapses by Benedikt Doll and Simon Schempp left the team with bronze medals at the finish.
On a windy, gusty day, the relay instead came down to a race between Norway and Sweden. Coming into the last shooting stage Fredrik Lindström of Sweden and Emil Hegle Svendsen of Norway were stride for stride. Each missed their first shot in standing, but Lindström pulled himself together and hit the next four shots, then hit the final target using a spare round. Svendsen, on the other hand, kept missing and ended up skiing a penalty loop – just as he had when anchoring the Norwegian team in the Olympics in Sochi four years ago.
A strong leg from Tim Burke, who cleaned prone and then survived on spare rounds while chaser Martin Fourcade of France headed to the penalty loop, helped the U.S. secure a best-ever sixth-place finish in the Olympic men’s relay. (Photo: FlyingPointRoad)
Then, that left Norway off the podium. This time, Norway still earned silver, as behind him Schempp had his own shooting woes.
An exciting relay with multiple lead changes in the end turned into something of a blowout, with Lindström able to celebrate on his final loop before joining overjoyed teammates Peppe Femling, Jesper Nelin, and Sebastian Samuelsson at the finish. It was the first Olympic relay gold medal in the history of Swedish biathlon, and the team did it with phenomenal shooting – just seven spare rounds despite difficult conditions. They were the only team to avoid the penalty loop, which most teams visited more than once.
The Norwegian squad of Lars Helge Birkeland, Tarjei Bø, Johannes Thingnes Bø, and Svendsen finished 55.5 seconds back. The Germans with Lesser, Doll, Arnd Peiffer, and Schempp crossed the line +2:07.1, and the Austrian squad of Tobias Eberhard, Simon Eder, Julian Eberhard, and Dominik Landertinger were the first ones out of the medals, +2:52.5.
The American team of Lowell Bailey, Sean Doherty, Tim Burke, and Leif Nordgren finished sixth, +3:50.2, tying the best-ever men’s relay finish by an American team at the Olympics. They had 14 spare rounds and two penalty loops.
The Canadian squad of Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Macx Davies, and Brendan Green finished 11th, +5:40.3, with 11 spare rounds and a penalty loop.
Norway’s Johannes Thingnes Bø racing to another win in the men’s 10 k sprint on a bluebird day on Friday at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy. (Photo: Manzoni/NordicFocus)
IBU World Cup (Antholz, Italy): Men’s 10 k sprint
One prone penalty wasn’t enough to keep Johannes Thingnes Bø from his third-straight victory (and ninth this season, including relays) as the 24-year-old Norwegian won the men’s 10-kilometer sprint on Friday at the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup in Antholz, Italy.
Bø started 42nd of 109 men and had to navigate tricky wind conditions, along with the rest of the field. After missing one target in the prone shooting, Bø left the range in third, 4.8 seconds behind the race leader at the time, Austria’s Julian Eberhard, and 2.6 seconds behind his Norwegian teammate Lars Helge Birkeland in second.
Throughout the race, Bø set the fastest course times and took a sizable lead over Birkeland and Eberhard after standing, which he cleaned and left the range 33.5 seconds ahead of Birkeland, who had also hit all five standing targets. Eberhard missed two to slip 1:11.6 minutes back.
Bø went on to cross the finish line in 23:19.3 minutes, faster than France’s Martin Fourcade (who started behind him in bib 48 and cleaned both stages), as Fourcade finished 12.8 seconds back in second.
The men’s 10 k sprint podium at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy, with Norway’s Johannes Thingnes Boe (c) in first, France’s Martin Fourcade (l) in second, and Germany’s Arnd Peiffer (r) in third. (Photo: Manzoni/NordicFocus)
Germany’s Arnd Pfeiffer started 47th, just ahead of Fourcade, and raced to third (+42.2) with clean shooting as well.
“In the sprint, you almost always have to shot clean,” Bø reflected after, according to an IBU press release. “After my prone miss, I knew a podium would be hard, but you never know; you fight hard. With zero in standing, I knew there was a chance … I had the times from the start and knew I had good speed today … Martin is almost always stronger than me on the last lap, but today I was not tired.”
Fourcade pointed out that this was his best sprint result in Antholz, a high-elevation venue at some 5,200 feet above sea level, since 2011, “so I am pretty satisfied,” he told the IBU.
Pfeiffer told German broadcaster ARD that he latched onto Fourcade for the last loop.
“At least I was clean on the shooting range today, that was not so easy,” Pfeiffer said, according to a translation. “I am pretty proud I managed to do that today. This was not my best day on the course, even if the position might insinuate something else. I had to toil quite a bit, and was lucky that Martin came by for the final [loop], who also wasn’t in his top shape today.
“In the end of course the result was great, I haven’t been on the podium in an individual-start race so far this season,” Pfeiffer continued. “So I am happy about 100 percent shooting accuracy and hopefully being on the podium if everything works out.”
Russia’s Anton Shipulin missed the podium by about four seconds in fourth (+46.3) with one standing miss (0+1), France’s Emilien Jacquelin placed fifth (+53.7) with clean shooting, Birkeland ended up sixth (+1:07.8) with zero penalties as well, Eberhard was seventh (+1:21.7) with two misses (0+2), Russia’s Anton Babikov eighth (+1:27.8; no penalties), Vladimir Chepelin of Belarus ninth (+1:32.3; one penalty), and the Czech Republic’s Ondrej Moravec 10th (+1:35.4; no penalties).
US Biathlon’s Lowell Bailey racing to 41st in the men’s 10 k sprint at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy. (Photo: US Biathlon/NordicFocus)
Three out of five Americans qualified for Saturday’s pursuit, with Lowell Bailey leading them in 41st (+2:22.0) after one standing miss (0+1). Notably, he had the fifth-fastest overall shooting time.
Tim Burke was just another 0.4 seconds back in 43rd (+2:22.4) with three penalties (1+2), and Leif Nordgren finished 50th (+2:33.1) with two penalties (1+1) and the second-fastest overall shooting time and third-fastest range time.
Macx Davies, who was selected to Biathlon Canada’s Olympic team, was the top Canadian in 66th (+2:58.2) with three misses (1+2). Carsen Campbell finished 82nd (+3:27.9) with two penalties (2+0), Matthew Hudec was 89th (+3:40.6) with one miss (0+1), and Aidan Miller 107th (+5:00.3) with five penalties (3+2).
The men’s and women’s pursuits will be held Saturday in Antholz at 7:15 a.m. for the women and 9 a.m. for the men EST. Watch live on the Olympic Channel.
Western Canadian Championships (Red Deer, Alberta): Freestyle sprints
Olivia Bouffard-Nesbitt (c) holds off Zina Kocher (l) and Annika Hicks (r) to win the women’s 1.2 k freestyle sprint final on Friday at the NorAm Western Canadian Championships in Red Deer, Alberta. (Photo: Doug Stephen)
The NorAm series shifted west to to Red Deer, Alberta, for the fourth weekend of racing.
Olivia Bouffard-Nesbitt (Rocky Mountain Racers) won the women’s 1.2-kilometre freestyle sprint A-final in 3:09.12, edging out Zina Kocher (Foothills Nordic) and Annika Hicks (Alberta World Cup Academy) by 0.4 and 0.77 seconds, respectively. They qualified in the same order in a small women’s field of 20. Organizers opted to skip the quarterfinals and pinned the top 10 women from the qualifier in two semifinals.
Jess Cockney (302) winning the men’s 1.2 k freestyle sprint final ahead of Russell Kennedy (r) on Friday at the NorAm Western Canadian Championships in Red Deer, Alberta. (Photo: Doug Stephen)
The men’s 1.2 k qualifier had 38 starters, and 22 advanced to the quarterfinals. After qualifying in second, 0.16 seconds off the top time set by Russell Kennedy (Team R.A.D.), Jess Cockney (Canadian World Cup Team) won his quarterfinal and semifinal and ultimately the men’s final in 2:24.29, 1.09 seconds ahead ofKennedy in second. PatrickStewart-Jones (Alberta World Cup Academy) grabbed his first podium of the season, taking third (+1.70).
Western Canadian Championships usually draw a smaller field than Easterns: more Canadians live within reasonable driving distance of Eastern Canadian Championships (hosted by Nakkertok in Cantley, Quebec) than live in all three times zones of western Canada combined.
With many of the top athletes in Europe doing final elevation camps for the Olympics and U23s/Junior World Championships, the Western Championships’ open and junior categories were particularly small this year with 287 athletes total.
The Norwegian men’s relay after winning the 4 x 7.5 k on Friday at the IBU World Cup in Ruhpolding, Germany, with Lars Helge Birkeland (l), Tarjei Bø (far r), Emil Hegle Svendsen (second from r), and Johannes Thingnes Bø (second from l). It was their second win of the season (after winning with Ole Einar Bjørndalen, Henrik L’Abée-Lund, and Erlend Bjøntegaard, and Birkeland in the first men’s relay of the 2017/2018 season in Hochfilzen, Austria. (Photo: IBU/Biathlonworld)
IBU World Cup (Ruhpolding, Germany): Men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay
Less than a week after Sweden won the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay in Oberhof, Germany, with an up-and-coming group, Norway posted its second win (in three relays) this season, with an all-star lineup on Friday in Ruhpolding, Germany.
Lars Helge Birkeland, Tarjei Bø, Emil Hegle Svendsen, and Johannes Thingnes Bø took the lead during Johannes Bø’s anchor leg and ultimately the win in 1:13:11.1 hours, 24.9 seconds ahead of France in second and 53.4 seconds ahead of Russia in third.
On a bluebird day with no wind in the range, according to an International Biathlon Union (IBU) press release, the Norwegians avoided the penalty lap and used seven spares to clean. First-leg skier Birkeland put them in second with near-perfect shooting (0+0, 0+1), just 0.4 seconds behind Germany’s Erik Lesser, who cleaned without any spares, in first. (Birkeland was also on the Norwegian team that won the first relay of the season in Hochfilzen, Austria.)
Norway remained in second during Tarjei Bø’s second leg, in which he had to use three spares to clean prone (0+3, 0+0). He tagged Svendsen in second, 0.6 seconds behind Italy, which had risen to first thanks to Lukas Hofer’s fast skiing and solid shooting (0+0, 0+2).
Svendsen slipped slightly to third place by the final exchange despite only needing one spare to clean (0+0, 0+1), but was still just a second out of first at the tag. France had moved into first place with a predictably strong third leg from Martin Fourcade (0+0, 0+0), in which he brought the team from seventh to first place, just ahead of Italy’s Dominik Windisch and Norway’s Svendsen.
Johannes Bø skied the third-fastest anchor leg and cleaned prone and used two spares in standing (0+0, 0+2) to overtake France’s Antonin Guigonnat and Italy’s Thierry Chenal, who slipped to second and seventh, respectively, by the finish.
Guigonnat shot well, requiring just one spare (0+1, 0+0), but finished nearly 25 seconds after Bø for second place. Russia reached the podium with Anton Shipulin picking off two places, after being tagged in fifth.
In all, France had zero penalties and six spares, with Simon Desthieux, Quentin Fillon Maillet, Fourcade, and Guigonnat, and Russia used a total of just four spares and had no penalties with Alexey Volkov, Maxim Tsvetkov, Anton Babikov, and Shipulin.
Germany finished fourth (+1:26.5) with zero penalties and 10 spares, with Lesser, Benedikt Doll, Arnd Peiffer and Simon Schempp. After Doll dropped to fifth on the second leg, they skied in fourth on the last two legs.
Austria took fifth (+1:39.8) with zero penalties and six spares, with David Komatz, Simon Eder, Daniel Mesotitsch, and Dominik Landertinger. Sweden followed in sixth (+1:50.6) with zero penalties, six spares and three of the same men who won last Sunday’s relay (Sebastian Samuelsson, Martin Ponsiluoma and Fredrik Lindström) with new member Torstein Stenersen. Italy finished seventh (+1:58.5) with one penalty and 11 spares.
Of 26 teams in the relay, Canada placed 14th (+3:22.3) with one penalty and 10 spares, and the U.S. finished 24th (+16:21.6) with eight penalties (four of which stemmed from cross-firing) and 13 spares.
Notably, the U.S. had been fourth and just 3 seconds out of first after Lowell Bailey’s first leg, which he cleaned without any spares (0+0, 0+0). Leif Nordgren then dropped to 22nd with a penalty in each of his shooting stages (1+3, 1+3) and the 25th-ranked second-leg time. Tim Burke as the team’s third leg had to ski two penalty laps as well (0+2, 2+3), and anchor Sean Doherty was penalized for cross-firing in his last standing stage (0+1, 4+1), according to a US Biathlon press release, and the team was hit with four additional penalties.
“We have a solid team and I know we didn’t show our true potential today,” Bailey said, according to the release. “But the most important relay is still to come. We’ll just have to wait until then.”
“I was happy to put together a good race on the track and in the range,” he said. “The first lap was a bit of a roller derby with no easy way to get to the front. I was fortunate to clean without extra rounds because this allowed me to leapfrog up to the lead pack exiting the range. I tried to keep an even pace for loop two and I thought I would be able to hang in second or third, but no one wanted to pass so I had to lead for most of the loop.
“I had struggled in standing in the previous race so I wanted to get back to taking good shots in standing,” he added. “Although I didn’t shoot as quickly as some of the other guys, I felt good about the stage and the fact that I didn’t have to use extras. It was a fight to catch the lead group on the last loop, but fortunately I had some help from [Italy’s Thomas] Bormolini (of Italy) and we worked together to get back in contact with the lead group.”
Canada finished 14th with Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Macx Davies, and Brendan Green. On the opening leg, Christian Gow put them in 11th with clean prone shooting and just one spare needed to clean standing (0+0, 0+1), but they slipped one spot to 12th with a penalty on Scott Gow’s second leg (0+0, 1+3). Davies then dropped two more places to 14th despite avoiding the penalty lap (0+3, 0+1), and Green held that position to the finish (0+1, 0+1).
The women’s 4 x 6 k relay will be held Saturday in Ruhpolding, with Canada starting Emma Lunder, Julia Ransom, Sarah Beaudry, and Rosanna Crawford. For the U.S., it will be Susan Dunklee, Clare Egan, Emily Dreissigacker, and Joanne Reid. Watch it live on the Olympic Channel at 8:30 a.m. EST.
APU’s Tyler Kornfield (126) leads APU’s Eric Packer (118) and DU’s Eivind Romberg Kvaale (124) to the line in the men’s 30 k classic mass start at 2018 U.S. Cross Country Championships on Sunday in Anchorage, Alaska. Kornfield, Packer, and Kvaale finished first, second and third, respectively. Kris Freeman (10, second from left) was fourth overall and the third American.
U.S. Cross Country Championships (Anchorage, Alaska): 20/30 k classic mass starts
Sweden’s Hedda Bångman denied Caitlin Patterson of her first outright victory of the week at 2018 U.S. Cross Country Championships, but Patterson as the first American racked up her third-straight national title in the women’s 20-kilometer classic mass start at Kincaid Park on Sunday in Anchorage, Alaska.
The top-three Americans in the women’s 20 k classic mass start on Sunday at 2018 U.S. nationals in Anchorage, Alaska, with Caitlin Patterson (1) of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project (CGRP) in first, Rosie Frankowski of APU (l) in second, and Kaitlynn Miller (r) of CRGP in third.
Bångman, a 22-year-old freshman at the University of Colorado Boulder (CU), pulled off a 15.9-second win in the mass start, crossing the line in 1:00:55.3 hours. Patterson, of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project (CGRP), finished second, but was the top American in the event for the third time this week, and Rosie Frankowski, of Alaska Pacific University (APU), notched third (second American), 19.6 seconds back.
Rounding out the top 10 was Jessica Yeaton, who trains with APU and races for Australia, in fourth (+44.1), Kaitlynn Miller (CGRP) as the third American in fifth overall (+1:13.5), Alayna Sonnesyn of the University of Vermont (UVM) in sixth (+1:25.3), Chelsea Holmes (APU) in seventh (+1:55.4), Norwegian CU skiers Christina Rolandson and Anne Siri Lervik in eighth (+1:55.7) and ninth (+1:56.1), respectively, and Erika Flowers of the Stratton Mountain School (SMS) Elite Team in 10th (+2:14.6).
The men’s 30 k classic mass start was incredibly close, with APU’s Tyler Kornfield taking his first-ever distance national title (he was the 2012 classic sprint national champion) in 1:21:43.6. He edged his teammate Eric Packer by 0.7 seconds at the line, and Eivind Romberg Kvaale, a sophomore at the University of Denver (DU), finished 1 seconds back in third.
Kris Freeman (Caldwell Sport) was just off the overall podium in fourth (+1.6), but was the third American. Another DU skier, Dag Frode Trollebø, also from Norway, finished fifth (+2.0), and APU had three in the top six with David Norris in sixth (+2.5). Noah Hoffman (Ski & Snowboard Club Vail) finished seventh (+2.6), Scott Patterson (APU) eighth (+3.6), and Craftsbury’s Adam Martin and Ben Lustgarten followed in ninth (+14.7) and 10th (+14.9), respectively. With Brian Gregg (CXC/LNR/Team Gregg) in 11th (+16.1), the men’s top 11 were separated by less than 17 seconds.
IBU World Cup (Oberhof, Germany): Men’s and women’s relays
Racers on the range during the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on a foggy Sunday at the IBU World Cup in Oberhof, Germany. (Photo: IBU/Biathlonworld)
The Swedish men’s team and French women won the second relays of the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup season on Sunday, with Sweden winning the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay by 1:10.8 over Italy, and France besting Germany by 32.4 seconds.
Notably, most of the top teams didn’t start all of their “A” teamers.
In the men’s race, Sweden’s Martin Ponsiluoma, Jesper Nelin, Sebastian Samuelsson, and Fredrik Lindström combined for their first win together — and the first win for most of the members on the team.
“It is a dream when you are a kid to compete in a World Cup,” Samuelsson said, according to an IBU press release. “To have a win is really amazing!”
The Swedish women’s team also landed on the podium in third (+48.2).
“What a race by the whole team,” said Lindström, who also has one non-relay World Cup win (from 2012) to his name. “It could not be better.”
Conditions could not have been much more difficult for shooting on Sunday, with the fog that had descended early in the day for the women’s race worsening for the men’s race. When there wasn’t fog, there was wind.
Misses were common throughout the two races, and even with racers being able to use three spares per shooting stage to clean, there were a high number of penalty laps.
But the Swedish men kept their penalties to a minimum, with just one for the entire team and a total of nine spare rounds used among them. After Ponsiluoma came through the first exchange in sixth, Nelin skied them into third, Samuelsson picked off another place despite skiing a penalty after his standing stage to put them in second, and Lindström anchored them to first.
“The conditions today were so special. Somehow I felt not so nervous, I was calm and had luck on my side,” Lindström said at a post-race press conference about his nearly flawless shooting (0+0; 0+1).
“I have never [been first] before,” he added. “Not like this in a relay at least. That’s really fantastic.”
“I had to look up to see if I was aiming the right way,” Nelin said after cleaning prone (0+0) then using two spares to clean standing (0+2). “I had no idea where I was aiming, so it was really difficult. But I hit, and it was good. Maybe these conditions fit me and I should never see anything.”
Italy placed second with Thomas Bormolini, Lukas Hofer, Dominik Windisch, and Thierry Chenal combining for two penalties and 11 spares. Hofer had skied them up from eighth to second, and Windisch then took the lead on the third leg to put them in first at the final exchange, 1 minute ahead of Sweden. But Chenal slipped with the seventh-fastest last leg time and a penalty after standing.
“Being on the podium with the team is always a special feeling,” Hofer said at the press conference. “For Thierry, it’s the first year in the World Cup, and he does a really good job, not just today. I am really happy that he could close out this relay. Second place is like a win for us.”
Norway placed third (+2:04.6) with Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen, Henrik L’Abée-Lund, Lars Helge Birkeland, and Tarjei Bø. Together, they had three penalties (two from L’Abée-Lund and one from Birkeland) and 14 spares.
“I grew up on Holmenkollen so I practiced a lot there [in fog],” L’Abée-Lund said. “But today was really really hard, I didn’t see anything in prone. Standing was OK, but prone was really difficult.”
“It’s great to be on the podium,” Christiansen said. “Of course Norway always wants to win, but today we are very happy for our brothers in our neighbor-country Sweden.”
The Canadian men placed 10th (+6:23.1) out of 25 teams with Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Brendan Green, and Carsen Campbell having a combined six penalties and 20 spares. Three of those penalties came on Scott Gow’s second leg, two from Campbell’s anchor leg, and one on Christian Gow’s first leg.
After a penalty on his first prone stage (1+3), Christian cleaned standing with a spare (0+1) and tagged Scott in 11th, 53 seconds out of first. Scott then had two penalties in prone and three in standing, but managed to improve to eighth given how much everyone else was struggling with the shooting as well. Green kept them in eighth with two clean stages (0+2, 0+3), and Campbell, in his first World Cup relay, cleaned prone (0+2) but had two standing penalties (2+3) to put the team in 10th at the finish.
In an interview with German broadcaster ARD halfway through the race, Canadian coach Matthias Ahrens called the range conditions, which ranged from thick fog to unpredictable wind, “very hard to assess.”
“… To be honest, the good thing was that conditions were very bad,” he later added. “So regarding visibility, almost everyone was on the range at the same time [with the same irregular conditions]. They had to wait very long, and of course had bad conditions to shoot, but much of the field was there at the same time.”
The French women’s team, of Anais Bescond, Anais Chevalier, Celia Aymonier, and Justine Braisaz, celebrate their relay victory on Sunday at the IBU World Cup in Oberhof, Germany. (Photo: IBU/Biathlonworld)
In the women’s race, with better shooting visibility, France’s Anais Bescond, Anais Chevalier, Celia Aymonier, and Justine Braisaz took the win in 1:12.42.4, with one penalty and 10 spares. After Bescond put them in first through the first exchange, 6 seconds ahead of Italy in second, Chevalier had to ski a penalty loop after prone but cleaned standings (1+3, 0+0) and tagged off in second, 23 seconds behind Italy, now in first.
One loop later, France was back in first thanks to Aymonier, who cleaned with just two spares (0+0, 0+2), and they extended their lead from 0.8 seconds at the last exchange to 32 seconds at the finish with Braisaz, who shot 0+1, 0+3, and skied the fastest anchor leg.
“I know that it’s always good for Justine to start in the first position, so I really wanted to pass the relay to her in that,” Aymonier said in a press conference after.
“I was nervous, too,” Braisaz said. “That kind of shooting turned my mind upside down, actually. The crowd was very loud, and … I wasn’t very focused on what I did. It was a bit foggy, too, so that made it harder. But finally it was a French day, maybe.”
“In my mind the whole team is really strong, and really able to get the first place,” Bescond said. “After years and years and years behind Germany’s team we finally did it. So just Oberhof spirit I think.”
Germany placed second with Vanessa Hinz, Denise Herrmann, Franziska Preuss, and Maren Hammerschmidt. They combined for two penalties and 13 spares; with a penalty on Hinz’s first leg and one more on Hammerschmidt’s last shooting. After being tagged in 14th, Herrmann skied them into fourth, 40 seconds out of first, and Preuss elevated them to second, which Hammerschmidt held onto.
“I was struggling a little bit in the prone shooting,” Herrmann said. “But the skiing was good today, and also the standing [shooting]. I tried to go fast on the track and catch some girls.”
Sweden, with Linn Persson, Anna Magnusson, Elisabeth Högberg, and Mona Brorsson, avoided the penalty loop and used eight spares to reach the podium for the first time in six seasons. In sixth place at the first exchange, they slipped one place to seventh on the second leg, but Högberg raced them up to fourth with near-perfect shooting (0+0, 0+1) with one leg to go. Brorsson then anchored them to third with clean shooting (0+2, 0+1) and the third-fastest last leg.
“It’s just super nice for us! I am super happy,” Magnusson said. “We were very emotional at the finish.”
When Brorsson was asked if she believe she could fight for the podium, she responded, “Not really. But I said to Linn, ‘Maybe it is our day today. Please let it be our day today.’ ”
The Canadian women finished 14th (+6:37.5), out of 20 teams, with two penalties and 13 spares. Sarah Beaudry initially put them in 15th after shooting 0+1, 0+2, then Julia Ransom had a standing penalty (0+2, 1+3) to slip one place to 16th. Megan Tandy picked off three places with clean shooting (0+0, 0+2) and tagged Emma Lunder in 13th, and Lunder had a penalty in prone but cleaned standing (1+3, 0+0) to finish in 14th.
The men’s overall 2018 Tour de Ski podium atop Alpe Cermis after the final Stage 7 hill climb: with Switzerland’s Dario Cologna (c) in first, Norway’s Martin Johnsrud Sundby (l) in second and Canada’s Alex Harvey (r) in third. (Photo: FIS Cross Country/Twitter)
Dario Cologna of Switzerland added a fourth Tour de Ski (TdS) title to his list of accolades on Sunday, winning the 2018 edition of the race in dominant fashion, with a 1:26.5-minute win over Norway’s Martin Johnsrud Sundby. And Canada’s Alex Harvey scored his first TdS overall podium in third.
The 31-year-old Cologna started the 9-kilometer freestyle pursuit up Alpe Cermis 1:15 ahead of Kazakhstan’s Alexey Poltoranin in second. Russia’s Sergey Ustiugov, slated to start third, did not start due to a back injury. Thus Harvey was the third man off the start line, 1:23 behind Cologna.
(Sweden’s Marcus Hellner, 13th after Saturday’s Stage 6, also did not start the Tour’s final stage.)
Early on, Cologna started putting time into his competitors, extending his lead on Poltoranin to 1:20.5 and Harvey to 1:24 at 1.8 k.
By 4 k, however, Harvey had used his speedy skiing on the flatter portions of the race leading up to the climb to catch Poltoranin, and the two clocked through that checkpoint 1:19.4 behind Cologna. Behind them, Russia’s Alexander Bolshunov skied just ahead of Sundby, another 21 seconds and 22 seconds back, respectively, in fifth and sixth.
While Harvey clawed back a few more seconds on Cologna, he was still 1:17.8 back at 6.2 k, with Poltoranin just 0.7 seconds behind him in third.
Harvey remained in second until around 8.5 k; with just a half kilometer to go, Sundby had caught both Poltoranin and Harvey, passing them both. Sundby held that position and finished second, 1:26.5 behind Cologna, who won in 28:52.1.
Harvey stayed strong for third (+1:30.6) while Poltoranin dropped off the Canadian’s pace in the final half kilometer and finished fourth (+1:41.7). Norway’s Hans Christer Holund placed fifth (+2:17.8), Bolshunov lost a spot to finish sixth (+3:09.7), France’s Jean-Marc Gaillard finished seventh (+3:16.7), Sweden’s Daniel Rickardsson eighth (+3:20.8), and Russia’s Alexey Chervotkin and Andrey Larkov took ninth (+3:33.5) and 10th (+3:37.8), respectively.
France’s Maurice Manificat, known for his strength in freestyle hill climbs and pursuit races, rose from 14th to 11th (+3:45.7) with the second fastest time of day, 12.8 seconds slower than Sundby as the time of day winner in 28:36.4. Cologna’s time was fourth fastest (+15.7), behind Russian U23 skier Denis Spitsov in third (+14.3) (Spitsov started 20th and finished 13th). Holund’s time ranked fifth (+20.6) and Harvey’s time was sixth fastest (+23.6) of the 43 men that finished the race.
The lone American man to complete this year’s Tour, Paddy Caldwell (U.S. Ski Team) skied the 22nd fastest time of day for 38th overall (+11:54.8).
Heidi Weng (center) celebrates her second Tour de Ski victory, with teammate Ingvild Flugstad Østberg second and the U.S. Ski Team’s Jessie Diggins third. (Photo: FIS Cross Country/Twitter)
In the women’s hill climb that kicked off the day, Heidi Weng raced to her second consecutive TdS title. The Norwegian started the day within two seconds of teammate Ingvild Flugstad Østberg, and the two skied together for the flat section of the nine-kilometer stage of the competition. But when the climbing got steep on Alpe Cermis, Weng left her teammate behind and eventually racked up a 48.5-second win.
The battle for third was less predictable. Jessie Diggins of the United States started the day in fourth, but made up the ten seconds to third-place KristaPärmäkoski of Finland in the first few kilometers. The pair climbed together for a while before Diggins attacked. Pärmäkoski tired on the final sections of the Alpe Cermis and Diggins took the podium in definitive style, 2:23.2 behind Weng and 24 seconds ahead of Pärmäkoski. It’s the first overall Tour de Ski podium for Diggins or any American athlete.
Teresa Stadlober of Austria finished fifth (+3:09.4), Kerttu Niskanen of Finland sixth (+4:17.0), Russia’s Anastasia Sedova seventh (+4:49.6), and Switzerland’s Nathalie von Siebenthal eighth (+4:56.1).
Sadie Bjornsen started eighth and slipped one spot to finish ninth (+6:15.0), giving the U.S. two top-ten finishers in the Tour de Ski for the first time. Liz Stephen finished 16th (+8:25.8) and Rosie Brennan 24th (+10:59.6).
En route to her win, Weng notched the fastest time of the day on the 9 k stage. Stadlober’s time was second, Diggins third, Østberg fourth, and Stephen fifth.
32 women finished this year’s edition of the Tour de Ski.
Leif Nordgren (US Biathlon) skiing the second leg of the IBU World Cup men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Sunday in Hochfilzen, Austria. The U.S. men ended up ninth overall out of 26 teams. (Photo: IBU/NordicFocus)
Strong gusts of wind on the range required strong nerves and a lot of luck in the women’s and men’s relay races that concluded the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria, on Sunday afternoon.
While the relays concluded with teams on the podium one might expect there, tempestuous weather conditions that at times made it almost impossible to hit the targets also gave outsiders a good chance, and both the U.S. men and Canadian women remained in contention for a long time. The men’s 4 x 7-5-kilometer relay was particularly wild with more than 100 penalty laps, and it began with a big surprise.
Belgium’s starter Michael Rösch tagged off in first place for the first time in the history of that team, representing a country that until now, rarely had enough athletes for a relay and had thus far had a 24th place at the 2016 World Championships to its credit. And on his tails was Norway’s Ole Einar Bjørndalen, and shortly behind them US Biathlon’s Lowell Bailey in third.
The three aforementioned athletes all raced in the Olympic relay more than a decade ago at the 2006 Winter Games in Torino, Italy, but back then Rösch raced for Germany and won gold with his team.
“I wanted to tag off in first at all costs, to see the Belgian flag at the top,” Rösch told TV broadcaster ARD on Sunday while the race was still going on. “But Ole made it really hard for me. … I was on my last fumes, I tumbled into the finish, I was just seeing black, but it definitely was worth it.”
Just a turn behind, Bailey had gotten off to a strong start for the U.S. team, temporarily taking the lead out of the arena on the first lap before shooting clean in his prone stage to put himself in the lead group of seven. Facing strong wind in his standing stage, Bailey missed two targets but avoided the penalty lap with his last spare in that stage (0+0, 0+3), and tagged off to teammate Leif Nordgren in third position, 23.8 seconds out of first.
Nordgren ended up with a penalty in his first prone after missing two targets, and returned to the course in fifth. While his penalty had increased the gap to first by 50 seconds, Nordgren made up a few seconds with a clean standing bout, hitting all targets without requiring a spare (1+3, 0+0).
Italy and France passed him on the final loop, and Nordgren handed off in seventh, 1:34.2 minutes behind Norway setting the pace up front.
“The team came pretty close to a good result today in a relay with nasty weather,” Nordgren wrote on his Instagram account. “Personally I’m quite disappointed with my skiing, it’s been a struggle to find the top gears so far this season and I’m far from where I know I should be. It’s a long season though and there is still plenty of time to turn it around.”
US Biathlon’s Tim Burke loading a spare in his prone stage of the men’s relay at the 2017/2018 IBU World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria. The team went on to finish 9th. (Screenshot: ARD broadcast)
Taking over next for the U.S. was Tim Burke, who pointed out this was one of the most challenging races in terms of wind that he’d experienced.
“This was definitely one [of the] windiest races that I have taken part in,” Burke wrote in an email to FasterSkier. “We knew it would be very challenging right from the start but our team tried to look at it as an opportunity for a top result. I feel like our team did a great job at avoiding any big disasters on the range and this allowed us to stay near the front for most of the race.”
After only needing one spare in his prone shooting to hit his last target, Burke incurred a penalty in his standing stage (0+1, 1+3), but kept his position on the final loop in a hard race against Switzerland’s Jeremy Finello to exchange still in seventh, now another minute back (+2:49.4).
“I was not surprised to see a mix of different teams near the front today,” Burke wrote. “It was one of those days that any team could find themselves with multiple penalty loops after a windy shooting stage.“
Taking over from Burke as the U.S. anchor leg was Sean Doherty, coming off two strong shooting performances in the sprint and pursuit earlier this week.
U.S. relay anchor Sean Doherty taking aim in difficult wind conditions during his standing stage of the men’s relay at the 2017/2018 IBU World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria. His team finished ninth. (Screenshot: ARD broadcast)
In his prone stage, Doherty again shot clean and fast (with the second-fastest prone shooting time on his leg) and overtook Switzerland to move into sixth. He kept that position on the course, vying for a position in the top five with the teams from France, Italy, Ukraine, and Russia also in his vicinity.
“Today was a crazy one for sure,” Doherty wrote in an email. “The conditions on the course were decent, firm tracks and we had good skis. The wind was whipping, so that really just made some sections a lot harder than normal when you added in the head wind. I have done races in bad weather before but today was amongst the most windy.
In the standing stage, Doherty hit his first four shots in another fast sequence before missing the last one. It looked as if he had thought that final shot was also a hit as he dropped his rifle slightly, but then realized he had to load spares. Unable to clear the last target, Doherty ended up with the team’s third penalty.
“With the shooting you try to get a general idea of how far the wind is pushing the shots and do the best you can,” Doherty explained. “It’s a total toss up and the finish order is just a ranking of who battled the wind the best and had most to least luck along the way.”
He set out on his last loop in eighth place with Ukraine’s Dmytro Pidruchnyi and Switzerland’s Mario Dolder right ahead of him, and Russia’s Anton Shipulin ten seconds behind.
“The fight on the last lap is always tough,” Doherty wrote. “Although I felt better today I was not able to hang with the two guys I left the range with. I was able to ski a good lap but not enough to hold off Anton.”
After Shipulin passed him up the big last climb, Doherty came to the finish in ninth position, 3:38.3 minutes behind the winners with a team total of three penalties and 13 spares.
“We were not too excited with the end result because we saw the potential was there for a top 5,” Burke concluded for the team. “We are also all far from our best on the tracks right now, but are hopeful that will come with more racing.”
Norway Successful with Its ‘Second Unit’
Norway’s Lars Helge Birkeland, Erlend Bjøntegaard, Henrik L’Abée-Lund and Ole Einar Bjørndalen (left to right) following their victory in the men’s relay at the 2017/2018 IBU World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria. (Photo: IBU/Biathlonworld)
Norway started the men’s relay race without Emil Hegle Svendsen, who was sidelined with a cold, and also rested brothers Johannes Thingnes Bø and Tarjei Bø, both of whom had already won races this season.
But shooting was more important than skiing in a relay decided by strong crosswinds on the range, and that’s where the Norwegians coped by far the best. While Norway also required nine spares, which usually is a rather average performance in a relay, on Sunday this was the top shooting performance of the men’s relay.
After veteran Bjørndalen, Henrik L’Abée-Lund and Erlend Bjøntegaard had created a fairly comfortable lead of almost a minute on the first three legs, Lars Helge Birkeland anchored them to the victory by shooting clean in prone and only needing one spare to hit every target in his final stage despite some widely spread shots.
“It is really nice; a good start for Norway and good self confidence for the the rest of the season,” L’Abée-Lund said at the post-race press conference.
“It’s always fun to compete on the highest level with the best guys,” Bjøntegaard said. “I think I did pretty good on my leg today. It was tough conditions as it was for everyone else. I am just happy to show what I am capable of.”
“It feels great, it was an amazing feeling on the last loop, and really satisfied with my own leg,” Birkeland said. “I just decided to be offensive and attack and don’t think about the others and just do my own race. … We have a really strong team with a lot of good guys, so we don’t need to have all the best at the start to have a chance to win.”
All hopes for Germany’s Simon Schempp to contend with Birkeland for first were dashed when Schempp required three spares to clear both his prone and standing stages, narrowly avoiding the penalty lap twice.
Due to the huge distances between the top-three teams, the final loop was more of a cool down for their anchors, with Norway taking the win in 1:21:21.8 hours, just under two minutes ahead of Germany, with Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll, Arnd Peiffer and Schempp, in second (+1:54.9, with zero penalties and 17 spares).
“At least we avoided the penalty loop, for me it was definitely close in standing,” Peiffer told German broadcaster ARD. “There was so much wind that it was impossible to shoot calmly and controlled. … It was clear that today there would be some upsets, like Belgium being in the mix in front. You just had to somehow avoid the penalty lap.”
“The last years in Hochfilzen we have never been on the podium, so it’s the first time in like six years we are back again,” Peiffer said at the press conference. “So that’s a good start for us because normally we are struggling here and we don’t know why.”
France, which had rested its star Martin Fourcade and started Jean-Guillaume Beatrix, Simon Desthieux, Emilien Jacquelin, and anchor Quentin Fillon Maillet, finished another 40 seconds later in third (+2:34.0, with three penalties and 13 spares).
Another 20 seconds back, Sweden with Peppe Femling, Jesper Nelin, Sebastian Samuelsson, and Fredrik Lindström crossed the line in fourth (+2:54.8, with three penalties and 12 spares).
“Today was very hard, very strange result, because when we look at all the penalties on the result list it was just crazy,” Beatrix said at the press conference. “I am satisfied for the team, and I am also really satisfied for the newcomer Emilien because it’s his first two weeks on the World Cup and first relay, and he did a every good job and brought us to the podium.”
“Today I was a little bit stressed, because the French guys are so strong and I had to be at their level, so I am happy to do a good relay today,” the 22-year-old Jacquelin said.
And what happened to the brave team from Belgium? With three athletes who had just made an overnight trip from an IBU Cup race in Lenzerheide, Switzerland, they came through the second exchange in second place after Florent Claude only needed one spare in standing. On the last two legs, however, three penalties for both Tom Lahaye-Goffart and Thierry Langer put them in 16th at the finish (+6:24.9) , which was still a team-best relay result for Belgium.
Just ahead of them in a finishing sprint anchored by Brendan Green was Biathlon Canada, with a lineup that earned bronze at the 2016 World Championships in Oslo, Norway. On Sunday, however, the Canadians’ race began with difficulties for brothers Christian Gow (1+3, 2+3) and Scott Gow (1+3, 2+ 3), each having to ski three penalty laps and exchanging in 21st position already 4:45.7 minutes back. Then Nathan Smith (0+0, 0+2) and Green (0+3, 0+3) were able to move them up a bit again, with Smith putting them as high as 13th by the final exchange and Green anchoring them to 15th (+6:22.5, with six penalties and 20 spares).
Of 26 teams in the men’s relay, Norway and Germany were the only ones that succesfully avoided the penalty lap.
Hochfilzen World Champs Women’s Podium Repeats
Later on Sunday afternoon in the women’s 4 x 6 k relay in slightly better conditions than the men’s race, last season’s reoccurring winner Germany struck gold again.
Germany with (left to right) Vanessa Hinz, Franziska Hildebrand, Maren Hammerschmidt and anchor Laura Dahlmeier shows off their medals following their victory in the women’s relay at the 2017/2018 IBU World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria. (Photo: IBU/Biathlonworld)
The victorious world-champion quartet of Vanessa Hinz, Franziska Hildebrand, Maren Hammerschmidt,and Laura Dahlmeier won with a large lead ahead of Ukraine (+44.9) and France (+1:04.5). The first-, second- and third-place teams were a repeat of last season’s World Championships relay in Hochfilzen this past February.
Fighting for position with Ukraine and Switzerland on the third leg, Hammerschmidt got her team on the road to victory when she cleaned every target within 24 seconds despite difficult conditions to reclaim the lead, erasing the gap she had been handed of almost 30 seconds to first.
“For me it was very important to have a good standing shooting today, because the last two days were not so good,” Hammerschmidt said at the press conference. “I thought it was one of my best standing shootings, and I was so happy to go on the last loop and fight for every second to give to Laura.”
Dahlmeier returned to the World Cup after missing last week’s opening races with a cold, then had no major problems defending the lead. Dahlmeier used just one spare in each of her shooting stages, while Switzerland’s Irene Cadurisch as the closest pursuer had to ski a penalty lap. Germany finished in a time of 1:14:36.4, with zero penalties and nine spares.
“It’s a really cool feeling to be here again,” Dahlmeier said at the press conference. “Especially with the team. We know we can make a good race, but it’s important for every person to be good on the range and on the tracks. Relays are special races.”
“From the last year we have good memories about Hochfilzen … and today it was a good place, too,” Hildebrand said “I was really impressed with [Ukraine’s] Yulia Dzhima’s standing shooting, because she took all targets out while I used two extra bullets and was happy I could go out on the track again.”
Ukraine’s Olena Pidhrushna anchored her team, with Vita Semerenko, Yulia Dzhima and Valj Semerenko, to second (+44.9), thanks to the best team shooting performance of zero penalties and five spares, and despite a fall on the first leg by Vita Semerenko.
“I think our team spirit is very strong, without that we wouldn’t be on the podium, so I am very thankful to all the girls and our staff for making this happen,” Valj Semerenko said at the press conference, via a translator.
“My start this season was not so good … Actually today I was so nervous ahead of the relay,” Pidrushna explained. “But I saw that we had a little bit of extra time at the last exchange, and I calmed down a little bit and it worked well in the end. … And I think my team believes in me [to anchor it successfully].”
Twenty seconds behind her, France with Marie Dorin Habert, Celia Aymonier, Justine Braisaz and the current women’s World Cup leader Anaïs Bescond, passed Russia’s Ekaterina Yurlova-Percht on the final loop to claim third place (+1:04.5, with two penalties and 13 spares).
“Honestly at the beginning when I started I didn’t think a podium was still possible, but loop after loop I thought maybe I can still catch a podium [position],“ said Bescond, who skied the fastest course time on the final leg amidst strong competition.
A few seconds behind, Russia with Victoria Slivko, Tatiana Akimova, Irina Starykh, and Ekaterina Yurlova-Percht finished fourth (+1:09.0, with no penalty and nine spares).
Another 16 seconds back, Switzerland, with Elisa Gasparin, her older sister Selina Gasparin, Lena Häcki and Cadurisch finished fifth (+1:25.7, with two penalties and 12 spares) for Switzerland’s best women’s relay result, which fulfilled its national qualification criteria for the Olympics.
Canada in Contention
For Biathlon Canada, Emma Lunder started off the race in the middle of the field, and managed hit all her targets with one spare in her prone stage to leave the range in 16th position.
Biathlon Canada’s starter Emma Lunder (r) exchanging to Rosanna Crawford in the women’s relay at the 2017/2018 IBU World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria. Crawford temporarily moved up to fifth before the team finished in ninth position. (Screenshot: ARD broadcast)
While a number of competitors, including France’s Dorin Habert, incurred penalties, Lunder again needed just one spare to clean (0+1, 0+1) and moved Canada up to 1oth. After losing a few more seconds on her last loop to the leaders, with Germany’s Hinz up front, she tagged Rosanna Crawford in 12th position, 51.7 seconds back.
Crawford started out fast and also needed just one spare to hit all five prone targets, improving by three places to ninth.
“It was a tricky shooting day today, you really had to be aware of the wind, and be prepared to do a correction even part way through a bout of shooting,” Crawford wrote in an email. “In prone I made a correction of 5 left and 2 up and it was enough to keep me pretty centred.”
Then in her standing stage, she picked off four more positions with clean shooting and no spares to leave the range in fifth place, while most teams around her needed spares or even incurred a penalty in seemingly difficult wind conditions.
“I was really happy with my standing today,” Crawford explained. “I saw Brendan [Green] right before zero and he said that it’s worthwhile to take your time and make each shot a good one. So I really thought about that as I came into the shooting, there was a big gust right off the start, so I waited and could hear the women around me missing. Each shot was really precise. My shooting time was 33 seconds which is really slow for standing but still the 2nd fastest of my leg, which says a lot about the wind today!”
Biathlon Canada’s Megan Bankes shooting in her standing stage in the women’s relay at the 2017/2018 IBU World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria. The team finished ninth overall. (Screenshot: ARD broadcast)
Crawford tagged Megan Bankes in fifth (+36.3), after having regained 15 seconds on the leaders and skiing the second-fastest course time on the final loop.
“It’s always fun to tag off in a high position but today was a bit of a lucky draw for what you got in the range,” Crawford concluded.
The 20-year-old Bankes as Biathlon Canada’s youngest team member started out just as fast, nearly maintaining that time gap on the first loop.
“I was super stoked to be tagged in such a good place, but I definitely still felt that I was able to ski my own race,” Bankes wrote in an email. “I wanted to ski my best, and not lose to much time on the tracks, but also be controlled on the range, because I knew it was going to be a tricky shooting day.”
She was able to get through the prone stage with two spares in a stage when all leading teams needed them, keeping her in fifth. Bankes followed that up with just one spare in her standing shooting, temporarily moving up to fourth after overtaking Sweden’s Mona Brorsson.
“Coming into the range I was focussed on my own shooting more than anything else,” Bankes wrote. “I knew that the wind was pretty variable, and that I needed to make sure I took good, smart shots, and correct appropriately for the wind. I was super happy with how I ended up doing on the range, and also with my speed on my first couple of laps.”
On the last loop, Brorsson and Russia’s Starykh passed her, and Bankes came through the final exchange in sixth place (+1:28.8).
“I died a bit at the end, but I still managed to tag Julia in a good position, so for me it was a pretty great race!” Bankes concluded.
Shown on television in the exchange zone, looking back at the final curve to see when Bankes would arrive, Ransom took over as the anchor and skied a very fast first loop, just 1 second off the fastest pace on that loop.
She then managed to still clean all five targets in a controlled fashion, leaving the range again in fifth position, with Switzerland in sight and Russia nearby as well.
After a slower second loop, Ransom struggled to clean all her targets in the final stage, but avoided the penalty lap with her last shot and left the range in ninth position. Sweden’s anchor Anna Magnusson was still in sight, 10 seconds ahead, but extended her lead on the final loop, while Japan’s anchor Rina Mitsuhashi was already more than a minute behind Ransom in 10th.
Ransom crossed the line in ninth place (+2:31.6) with zero penalties and nine spares for the team.
“A top 10 is a decent result for our team, it’s nice that we were fighting for a top 6 for most of the race,” Crawford wrote. “Our team has come a long way and I’m really proud to be a part of this team! Emma and Megan had a great leg and Julia an awesome prone and then it was quite windy for her standing, but most teams have their strongest women on the last leg, so it’s always a hard fight!”
In other good news for Biathlon Canada this weekend, the team finished eighth in an IBU Cup mixed relay and national team member Megan Tandy raced to 11th place in the sprint followed by ninth place in the pursuit this weekend in Lenzerheide, Switzerland.
“Another #perfect#shooting day! I was hoping for more, but you gotta work with what you got – in my case very heavy legs skiing. Nonetheless, a solid race,” Tandy wrote on Instagram after shooting clean in both the sprint and mixed relay.
The U.S. Women and Nation Cup Standings
US Biathlon could not start a women’s relay on Sunday because it only has three women currently on the World Cup circuit: Susan Dunklee, Clare Egan and Emily Dreissigacker. US Biathlon had hoped that its fourth woman Kelsey Dickinson, would qualify for the first trimester of World Cup racing by scoring necessary points at the IBU Cup opener in Sjusjøen, Norway. But unfortunately that did not work out.
In addition to Dickinson missing out on the World Cup starts because of that technicality, and her teammates now missing out on one of only three opportunities on the World Cup competition calendar to prepare for the relay in the upcoming Olympics, this also means they lost out on valuable points for the Nation Cup Score. That ranking is its own award category in the World Cup season (last year Germany won it for both the women and men), but more importantly for the North American teams, also determines the starting quota for the following season.
With a third of the races counting towards that already completed (unlike at World Championships the races at the Olympics don’t apply, neither do pursuits and mass starts), the U.S. is currently in 21st position for the women with 676 points and in danger of losing its fourth starting position for next year again, which would make team selections and travel planning even harder.
While certainly not impossible — last year the U.S. women also did not start a relay in Pokljuka, Slovenia — it will be a bit of an uphill battle to make that up the rest of the season, requiring a number of strong results. For instance, South Korea is currently 357 points ahead in 17th, the benchmark for a fourth quota spot.
The Canadian women are currently in 14th position with 1220 points. Last season they were 15th and the U.S. 14th. For the men’s teams, Canada is currently in 12th position with 1260 points, the U.S. is 13th with 1198.
The teams will now travel to Annecy-Le Grand Bornand, France, for the next World Cup from Thursday, Dec. 14, to Sunday, Dec. 17.
Caitlin Patterson (Craftsbury Green Racing Project) charging up the wall climb en route to the win in the women’s 10 k freestyle on Sunday at the Sovereign Lake NorAm/SuperTour near Vernon, B.C. (Photo: Peggy Hung)
NorAm/SuperTour (Sovereign Lake near Vernon, British Columbia): 10/15 k freestyle
VERNON, B.C. — The combined NorAm and SuperTour event at the Sovereign Lake Nordic Centre continued with individual-start distance races and continued with the theme of U.S. domination of the leaderboard.
Ian Torchia, of Northern Michigan University (NMU) and the U.S. Ski Team D-team, started the day with a big victory in the men’s 15 k freestyle, finishing in 36:29.7 minutes and on the heels of Canadian Para-Nordic guide Graham Nishikawa, who started 30 seconds ahead of him and ended up sixth. Jack Hegman of the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation (SVSEF) placed second, 19.0 seconds back, to complete his good weekend. Canadian Para-Nordic superstar Brian McKeever rounded out the podium in third, 22.6 seconds back.
Graham Nishikawa (l) and Ian Torchia worked together after Torchia closed the 30-second gap en route to a victory in the men’s 15 k freestyle on Sunday at the Sovereign Lake NorAm near Vernon, B.C. (Photo: Peggy Hung)
The women were next to get some time in the sunshine with two laps for 10 k. Caitlin Patterson of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project (CRGRP) upgraded from Saturday’s silver to gold on Sunday with winning time of 27:13.0. Rosie Frankowski of Alaska Pacific University (APU) snatched second, 30.7 seconds back. Caitlin Gregg (Team Gregg) raced to third, 1 second behind Frankowski.
Former Canadian national-team biathlete Zina Kocher started her new cross-country career as the top Canadian in seventh (+1:31.2).
The weather was a repeat of Saturday: -2 degrees Celsius, windless and sunny. Smiles were evident everywhere, even for athletes who didn’t quite nail the pacing on an unforgiving course.
France’s Maurice Manificat (c) after winning the men’s 15-kilometer freestyle on Sunday in Davos, Switzerland. He finished ahead of Russians Sergey Ustiugov (l) and Alexander Bolshunov in second and third respectively. (Photo: FIS Cross-Country/Twitter)
FIS Cross Country World Cup (Davos, Switzerland): 10/15 k freestyle
After a day of sprinting, cross-country racers returned to the Davos World Cup venue on Sunday for the women’s 10-kilometer and men’s 15-kilometer freestyle individual start competitions.
For his first World Cup win in almost two years, France’s Maurice Manificat took the men’s 15 k race title in a time of 33:56.2. Exactly 4 seconds flat behind Manificat in second place was Russia’s Sergey Ustiugov. Ustiugov’s teammate Alexander Bolshunov, finished 10 seconds behind Ustiugov and 14.6 seconds behind Manificat for the men’s third and final podium spot.
The remainder of the men’s top ten included Norway’s Simen Hegstad Krüger in fourth (+21.3), Switzerland’s Dario Cologna in fifth (+26.5), Sweden’s Marcus Hellner in sixth (+35.4), Russia’s Denis Spitsov in seventh (+36.1), Hans Christer Holund of Norway in eighth (+36.9), Russian Alexey Chervotkin in ninth (+54.2), and Alex Harvey of Canada in 10th (+1:01.2).
The next best male North American finisher was American Patrick Caldwell in 41st (1:50.2).
Canada’s Devon Kershaw placed 44th (1:59.8), Graeme Killick 59th (+2:27.8), Russell Kennedy 68th (+2:43.4), and Julien Locke in 94th (4:27.5). Knute Johnsgaard did not start.
For the U.S., Noah Hoffman finished 48th (2:05.5) and Scott Patterson 88th (3:46.2). Simi Hamilton did not start and Andy Newell did not finish.
The women’s 10 k freestyle podium on Sunday at the Davos World Cup in Switzerland, with Norway’s Ingvild Flugstad Østberg (c) in first and Ragnhild Haga (l) in second, and Finland’s Krista Parmakoski (r) in third. (Photo: FIS Cross Country/Twitter)
In the women’s 10 k, 75 starters finished the 10 k course with Norway’s Ingvild Flugstad Østberg claiming first in a time of 25:28.5. Her Norwegian teammate, Ragnhild Haga finished 5.9 seconds behind her for second place. Krista Pärmäkoski of Finland raced to the third and final podium spot, 7.9 seconds back from Østberg’s winning time.
Rounding out the women’s top ten was Heidi Weng in fourth (+14.5), Austria’s Teresa Stadlober in fifth (+16.4), Switzerland’s Nathalie von Siebenthal in sixth (+16.4), Finland’s Kerttu Niskanen in seventh (+24.9), Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla in eighth (+26.8), Norwegian Marit Bjørgen in ninth (+35.9), and Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen in tenth (+37.6).
Leading the U.S. women was Sadie Bjornsen in 12th (+44.6), seven seconds outside the top ten. The next two Americans finishers were within 3.1 seconds of each other, with Kikkan Randall finishing 14th (+56.8) and Jessie Diggins in 15th (+59.9).
Also scoring World Cup points for the Americans, Rosie Brennan finished in 17th (+1:11.2) and Chelsea Holmes in 29th (+1:32.9).
The U.S.’s Liz Stephen and Sophie Caldwell finishedin 40th (+1:58.5) and 52nd (+2:20.1), respectively.
For the Canadians, the team was led by Cendrine Browne in 45th (+2:05.9), followed by Emily Nishikawa in 50th (+2:18.4). Dahria Beatty placed 73rd (+2:53.0) and Katherine Stewart-Jones 79th (+3:44.6).
IBU World Cup (Hochfilzen, Austria): Men’s and women’s relays
Men’s and women’s relays took place on the final day of racing in Hochfilzen, with Norway winning the men’s 4 x 7.5 k and Germany topping the women’s 4 x 6 k by considerable margins.
Norway’s Ole Einar Bjørndalen, Henrik L’Abée-Lund, Erlend Bjøntegaard, and Lars Helge Birkeland raced to first in 1:21.21.8 hours, nearly two minutes clear of Germany in second, after taking the lead on L’Abée-Lund’s second leg. They avoided the penalty loop and used a total of nine spares, and never lost hold of first place for the rest of the race.
Germany raced to second (+1:54.9) with Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll, Arnd Peiffer, and Simon Schempp, with zero penalties and 17 spares, after Peiffer lifted them from fourth to second on the third leg. Schempp held them there, despite using a maximum of three spares on each of his shooting stages, in the final leg.
France claimed third (+2:34.0) with Jean-Guillaume Béatrix, Simon Desthieux, Emilien Jacquelin, and Quentin Fillon Maillet, despite three penalties and 13 spares. Two of their penalties came on Beatrix’s first leg and another in Fillon Maillet’s final shooting. After being tagged in fifth, Jacquelin raced them up to third on the third leg and Fillon Maillet held onto that position for the last spot on the podium.
The U.S. men finished ninth (+3:38.3) with Lowell Bailey, Leif Nordgren, Tim Burke, and Sean Doherty, after they combined for three penalties and 13 spares. Bailey avoided the penalty lap and put them in third at the first exchange, while Nordgren slipped to seventh after a penalty, Burke remained in seventh with one penalty as well, and Doherty had one more penalty to anchor the team to ninth.
Canada placed 15th (+6:22.5) with six penalties and 20 spare rounds, with Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Nathan Smith, and Brendan Green. After being tagged in 21st, Smith raced them up to 13th, using just two spares to clean. Green anchored them to 15th after using six spares and skiing the 15th-ranked time on that last leg.
In the women’s relay that followed, Germany won by 44.9 seconds over Ukraine, with Vanessa Hinz, Franziska Hildebrand, Maren Hammerschmidt, and Laura Dahlmeier using nine spares while staying out of the penalty lap.
After Hinz raced them into first, Hildebrand slipped to fourth after using four spares on the second leg. Hammerschmidt raced the fastest third leg to put them back in first, and Dahlmeier held them there to the finish, crossing first in 1:14:36.4.
Ukraine (0 penalties, 5 spares) took the lead on the second leg but ultimately settled for second with Vita Semerenko, Yuliia Dzhima, Valj Semerenko, and Olena Pidhrushna. Dzhima put them in second heading into the race’s halfway point, but Valj Semerenko lost two places to tag Pidhrushna in third. Pidhrushna used just two spares on the final leg to bring them to second, about 20 seconds ahead of France in third.
Despite a tough first leg for Marie Dorin Habert, in which she had two penalties and tagged off in 14th, France rose to third place at the finish (+1:04.5) thanks to strong skiing and shooting from anchor Anaïs Bescond.
The team had a total of two penalties and 13 spares. Celia Aymonier used four spares to put them in ninth after the second leg, and third-leg Justine Braisaz lifted them one more place to seventh before Bescond skied the fastest last leg to pick off four more places.
Canada placed ninth (+2:31.6) with Emma Lunder, Rosanna Crawford, Megan Bankes, and Julia Ransom, with no penalties and nine spares. Crawford put them in fifth after the second leg, Bankes lost one place on the third leg, and Ransom slipped three more with three spares on her final shooting to finish ninth.
Norway’s Maiken Caspersen Falla celebrates across the line after edging out Russia’s Natalia Matveeva and her Norwegian teammate Ingvild Flugstad Østberg in the women’s cross-country sprint on Saturday at the 2017 Blink Skifestivalen in Sandnes, Norway. (Photo: Axelar/Ørjan Dalseth)
The fans in the well-filled stands of the 1-kilometer rollerski city course in Sandnes, Norway, had many reasons to cheer loudly on Saturday, as their local heroes claimed victories in all four sprint events that concluded the 2017 Blink Skifestivalen (Ski Festival).
In the final race of the day, the men’s cross-country sprint was decided by the length of a rollerski, with Norway’s Sindre Bjørnestad Skar crossing first, just 0.1 seconds ahead of Sweden’s Teodor Peterson. Skar took the win with a time of 3:27.6 minutes after two laps around the flat course, which featured two short climbs over a ramp and a bridge. The third place on the podium went to Kasper Stadaas, also of Norway, 1.9 seconds out of first.
Norway’s Sindre Bjørnestad Skar (front) lunges across the line ahead of Sweden’s Teodor Peterson in the men’s cross-country sprint at the 2017 Blink Skivestivalen on Saturday in Sandnes, Norway. (Photo: NRK screenshot)
Second in Friday’s mass start, Skar advanced through the rounds on Saturday with narrow victories in his quarterfinal and semifinal as well. Last season, Skar won a World Cup at the freestyle sprint in Toblach, Italy, and achieved two other podiums. He raced to third in the sprint qualification at the World Championships in Lahti, Finland, and went on to finish 13th.
Andy Newell of the U.S. Ski Team (USST) was the lone North American starter of the day, and his run ended in the quarterfinal heats when he crossed the line in third, 1.1 seconds behind Norwegians Sondre Turvoll Fossli and 0.3 seconds behind Sivert Knotten. In an Instagram post, he mentioned breaking three poles in three races he competed in at this year’s Blink. He finished 16th in the 60 k classic and 18th in the 15 k freestyle mass start.
In the women’s cross-country sprint, a number of the last season’s top sprinters contended for the podium. Reigning Sprint World Cup champion Maiken Caspersen Falla emerged with the victory in the final with a time of 3:49.6 after keeping her challengers at bay in the long finishing straight. Russia’s Natalia Matveeva placed second (+0.8) and another Norwegian Ingvild Flugstad Østberg took third (+1.1).
Earlier in the day, Falla won her semifinal, after she advancing from her quarterfinal with a wildcard. Originally Falla had finished the heat more than 30 seconds back, following a spill from which she emerged with a slightly bloody right knee.
“Suddenly the asphalt was there,” Falla told Norwegian broadcaster NRK, according to a translation. “I am very happy that I was able to protect the face and head… I was really scared. I’m terrified.”
She explained that it had been a long time since her last crash on rollerskis, and that she likely had placed a pole on her own shoe. No other athlete was involved in the incident, and her semifinal heat started with seven athletes.
On Friday, Falla placed third in the women’s 10 k mass start after outlasting the group of skiers she was with in the finishing straight.
In the women’s biathlon sprint, French veteran Marie Dorin-Habert made a minor rookie mistake while leading when she knelt down on the shooting mat for another prone shooting, before realizing that all her competitors had correctly taken a standing-position stance. Maybe she had assumed that — like the men in Saturday’s sprint format — they also would have to shoot four times.
France’s Marie Dorin-Habert (l) erroneously kneels down to take the prone position in the second shooting stage of the women’s biathlon sprint at the 2017 Blink Skifestivalen on Saturday in Sandnes, Norway. In the lead until that point, she went on to finish third. (Photo: NRK screenshot)
She quickly stood back up, but after incurring a penalty she was overtaken by Sweden’s Hanna Öberg and Norway’s Marte Olsbu. On the final lap Olsbu managed to pass the Swede to claim the victory in a time of 7:57.3 minutes with two penalties, while Öberg finished second (+2.8, with two penalties) and Dorin-Habert third (+5.0, with one penalty) ahead of Sweden’s Emma Nilsson (+9.4, with two penalties).
Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen after winning the men’s biathlon sprint on the last day of the 2017 Blink Skifestivalen on Saturday in Sandnes, Norway. (Photo: Axelar/Ørjan Dalseth)
In the men’s biathlon sprint, racers skied four loops and shot in four stages. Coming into the final shooting stage, Norway’s Lars Helge Birkeland and Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen, along with France’s Simon Fourcade, had created a small gap to the rest of the field. While Birkeland and Christiansen hit all their targets, Fourcade had to ski one short penalty lap through a traffic roundabout. Turning sharp left into the finishing stretch, Christiansen overtook Birkeland and pushed hard until the line in a time of 12:09.6 with two penalties, while Birkeland finished 4.6 seconds back in seconds place (with one penalty). Fourcade held onto third place (+16.2, with three penalties) ahead of a chase group.
The excited fans also sang a little birthday tune for Norway’s Tarjei Bø — who turned 29 on Saturday — as he came into the finish in seventh place (+42.2) smiling and waving to the crowd.
No North American biathletes raced at this year’s Blink.
Russia’s Sergey Ustiugov (1) winning the men’s 15 k freestyle rollerski mass start on Friday at the 2017 Blink Ski Festival. Norway’s Sindre Bjørnestad Skar (r) finished 2.2 seconds back in second. (Photo: Axelar/Rolf Gunnar Strand)
In the men’s 15-kilometer freestyle rollerski mass start on the third day of the 2017 Blink Ski Festival in the coastal town of Sandnes in the southwest of Norway, U.S. Ski Team (USST) member Andy Newell constantly held a position in the first group, staying within a few seconds of the leaders. With two laps to go, he was in sixth place, less than two seconds back.
“I felt good about the race,” Newell reflected in an email to FasterSkier. “I was able to ski up in the top 10 or so throughout the race.”
U.S. Ski Team member Andy Newell (bib 14) finishing behind South Korea’s Magnus Kim in the men’s 15 k mass start on Friday at the 2017 Blink Skivestivalen in Sandnes, Norway. (Photo: NRK screenshot)
But as the field heard the bell ringing that signaled the final lap, Newell suddenly skied out of the lead group and rolled to the right side of the city course waving his arm.
“Just before the start of the last lap I tried to maneuver around a skier to try to get up into the top maybe 5 or 6 skiers and broke my pole on that guy,” Newell explained. “I only had to ski maybe 100 meters with one pole and got a spare but that was enough to lose a lot of places. I can’t feel too bad, there were a lot of broken poles out there, it was still really fun and exciting and a cool atmosphere.”
After Russia’s reigning Tour de Ski winner Sergey Ustiugov prevailed in a group sprint to finish first in a time of 30 minutes, 29.5 seconds, Newell finished the race in 18th place, 24.1 seconds later. Second place went to Norway’s Sindre Bjørnestad Skar (+2.2), while Sweden’s Teodor Peterson claimed third (+2.9).
Norway’s Marit Bjørgen winning Friday’s 10 k freestyle mass start at the 2017 Blink Ski Festival, just 0.6 seconds ahead of Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla (r) in second. (Photo: Axelar/Ørjan Dalseth)
In the women’s 10 k freestyle mass start race, Norway’s Marit Bjørgen took her first win of the series in 21:25.8, narrowly outsprinting Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla by 0.6 seconds (a day after Kalla won the famous Lysebotn Opp uphill race by a comfortable 40-second margin). The duo gapped the field about 15 minutes into Friday’s race, after Kalla had caught up to Bjørgen and then took her turn up front. Winning the finishing sprint out of a larger chase group, third place went to Bjørgen’s teammate and defending Sprint World Cup champion Maiken Caspersen Falla, 8.3 seconds out of first.
A day after finishing the Lysebotn hill climb in sixth place, USST distance skier Liz Stephen crossed the line on Friday in 25th (+1:29.2) on the flat city course with 1 k loops that suited sprinters, despite two short climbs over fairly steep ramps.
While the 2016 edition of the festival was marred by some dramatic crashes on those ramps, this time the course remained manageable in cloudy-but-dry conditions, with the field of elite Norwegian and international athletes cheered on by several hundred enthusiastic spectators in the finish area.
Biathlon
Also on Friday, the Blink spectators could watch a number of biathlon competitions, both for various junior age groups and the senior fields.
In a pre-race event dubbed “shooting duels” with the athletes still not on skis, the local fan-favorites prevailed. Norway’s Thekla Brun-Lie won the women’s competition, moving through a series of rounds and cleaning the final in 20 seconds, while her teammate Johannes Thingnes Bø was successful in the men’s shootout, cleaning all targets of the standing shooting stage in a blazing-fast 15.7 seconds for the best time of the day. In a “superfinal”, Bø beat Brun-Lie head-to-head, despite requiring spares and about twice as much time as in the men’s final.
Norway’s Thekla Brun-Lie (l) and Johannes Thingnes Bø competing head to head in the final round of a shooting competition at the 2017 Blink Skifestivalen in Sandnes, Norway. Both went on to win their respective mass start races later on Friday. (Photo: NRK screenshot)
Both skiers made use of their excellent shooting accuracy and speed to win their respective races that followed (no exact distance was given). In the second half of the women’s biathlon mass start, Brun-Lie managed to overtake the Russia’s Ekaterina Yurlova-Percht with two clean standing stages, claiming victory in a time of 13:51.5 with one penalty. The penalty loops required rollerskiing on a traffic roundabout next to the range.
Brun-Lie, 25, is the younger sister of Celine Brun-Lie (a former Norwegian cross-country team member) and a 2011 junior world champion.
France’s veteran skier Marie Dorin-Habert finished second (+8.5 with four penalties), while Brun-Lie’s teammate Marte Olsbu also passed Yurlova on the final lap to place third (+14.3 with three penalties) and Yurlova finished fourth (+18.2 with two penalties).
In the men’s biathlon mass start, Sweden’s Tobias Arwidson held the lead after the first two prone shootings, before Bø and teammate Emil Hegle Svendsen overtook him with two clean standing shootings. While both also hit every target in the final standing stage, Bø managed to do it faster once again, crossing the line first in a time of 17:57.8 with three penalties. Svendsen placed second (+12.3) despite cleaning all four stages, and Lars Helge Birkeland completed the Norwegian podium sweep in third (+21.2 with three penalties).
Unlike in prior years, no North American biathletes have made the trip to Sandnes, Norway, for Blink. The event concludes on Saturday with sprint races for both the cross-country skiers and biathletes.
The photo finish for first in the IBU World Cup men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Saturday in Antholz, Italy, with Germany’s Simon Schempp (r) edging Norway’s Emil Hegle Svendsen (l) by 0.1 seconds. (Photo: IBU/Christian Manzoni)
For Germany and Norway, it was a two-way battle for first following the final exchange of the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay on Saturday at the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup in Antholz, Italy.
There, thanks to third-leg Johannes Thingnes Bø, Norway had taken the lead by 17.7 seconds over Germany and built a 38-second gap to Russia in third. Ukraine was another nine seconds back in fourth, skiing just ahead of France and the U.S. in fifth and sixth through the exchange, respectively.
So for the U.S. in Saturday’s relay, the last one before 2017 IBU World Championships in Hochfilzen, Austria, next month, it was a fight for a team-best result — which would have been fourth.
Before we get to where they finished, let’s remember where the U.S. men’s relay started: in bib 24 of 25, at the back of the pack.
Lowell Bailey raced them into sixth at the first exchange and 8.6 seconds out of the lead, with Russia’s Maxim Tsvetkov reaching the exchange first. Bailey had skied the fifth-fastest course time on that leg and shot quickly to clean with one spare in each of his two shooting stages.
Eighth after the first prone stage, he moved into sixth after his standing shooting. One loop later, he tagged his teammate Leif Nordgren in sixth.
Leif Nordgren (US Biathlon) skiing the second leg of the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Saturday at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
Nordgren proceeded to jet into third after his prone stage, despite using two spares to clean.
“It was a big bummer to miss two in prone, but the rest of the group also missed so I was able to leave towards the front,” Nordgren explained in a US Biathlon press release.
He used one more spare to clean his standing stage and remained in third heading into his final loop. There, Nordgren’s lack of racing this season caught up to him (this was his fifth World Cup race of the season), and he tagged off in ninth, 27.6 seconds behind Russia’s Evgeniy Garanichev in fifth.
“In the last loop I was holding on for dear life,” Nordgren told US Biathlon. “Those other guys have a lot more racing under their belts this year. I have four [races], so that made for a hard loop.”
While Nordgren and teammate Tim Burke had a shaky tag, which Burke described as a “bit of a collision,” Burke was able to emerge from it unscathed. He went on to ski the fourth-fastest third leg to bring the U.S. to sixth.
“I felt solid on course today,” Burke wrote in an email, after posting the third-fastest course time for that leg.
He used three spares to clean prone — any more misses and he would’ve had to ski a penalty loop — and started his second loop in ninth. The next time in the range, Burke cleaned standing without any spares and set out on his last loop in seventh.
“I pushed hard all the way to the shooting point before prone, which, in hindsight, was probably a bit too aggressive,” he reflected. “For standing my goal today was stay aggressive and I was happy with how that worked out.”
Burke started his last loop with France’s Simon Desthieux. “We were able to really push on the last loop and pull the others back,” Burke explained. “I wanted to hand off to Sean with the group that would fight for third place.”
Burke tagged his teammate Sean Doherty in sixth, 11.6 seconds out of third and just 4.3 seconds behind fourth. Meanwhile, Norway had taken the lead after Bø’s standing stage with clean shooting (and after using just one spare to clean prone) while Russia dropped to third with a total of four spares from Dmitry Malyshko.
Germany’s third-leg skier Arnd Peiffer took the lead after a miss-free prone stage, and using one spare in standing, left the range just 6 seconds after Bø to bring Germany into second at the final tag, 17.7 seconds from first.
Over the last three loops and two shooting stages, Norway’s anchor Emil Hegle Svendsen and Germany’s final skier Simon Schempp drew closer, with both cleaning prone without a miss. At the start of the second loop, Schempp was within 12.7 seconds of Svendsen. Back in the range for the last time, Svendsen missed his second and fifth shots, requiring two spares, and Schempp needed one spare to clean, and the two set out on the final loop together, with Svendsen leading by 0.3 seconds.
The two went head to head all the way to the finish, where Schempp ultimately outlunged Svendsen in a photo finish by one-tenth of a second. He secured the win for Germany in 1:13:57.2 hours, and the team — with Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll, Peiffer and Schemmp — used a total of seven spares to avoid the penalty loop.
“I gave it everything I had in the end, and wanted to attack a little earlier but [Svendsen] attacked incredibly up the bridge,” Schempp recalled in a post-race interview with ZDF. “I had a feeling that we crossed the line pretty much together. Then I had to wait what the computer would show as a result.”
“He was a little stronger,” Svendsen told NRK after. “I have no other explanation than that. I had to make sure I did not ski into him … so I lost a little momentum there.”
At the last World Cup relay in Ruhpolding, Germany, Norway won with Ole Einar Bjørndalen, Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen, Henrik L’Abee-Lund, and Svendsen. Russia finished second, Germany was third, and the U.S. was 12th.
“I think we presented ourselves with top ski speed today, and on the shooting range it clearly went better than in Ruhpolding, especially for me,” Lesser said, referring to his penalty and the team’s total of nine spares in the Ruhpolding relay (compared to Russia, which had two, and Norway with five spares in Ruhpolding).
“We still have those seven spares, I can remember the last time we became World Champions we only had two spares, so we definitely can get down there, but it was a cool final rehearsal,” Lesser said.
Norway took second with Lars Helge Birkeland, L’Abée-Lund (who brought the team from fourth to second at the second exchange), Bø, and Svendsen, after using nine spares.
Russia ended up third (+33.6), with Tsvetkov, Garanichev, Malyshko, and Babikov, with a team total of nine spares as well, and Ukraine pulled off fourth (+46.7) with just five total spares, with Artem Pryma, Sergey Semenov, Vladimir Semakov, and Dmytro Pidruchnyi.
Ukraine embarked on the last leg in fourth, 1:04 minutes out of first and just ahead of France in fifth and the U.S. in sixth.
On their first loop together, Doherty moved into fourth, trailing Russia’s Babikov in third by about eight seconds. With France’s Quentin Fillon Maillet, Doherty bridged the gap to Babikov, passing the Russian but remaining in fourth as the Frenchman skied into third.
In their prone stage, Doherty used one spare and Fillon Maillet cleaned to leave the range just ahead of him in fifth, while Doherty followed in sixth. Five teams continued to fight for the podium, with Ukraine’s Pidruchnyi leading them in third.
Pidruchnyi didn’t miss a shot in either stage to hold that position until his final loop, where Babikov passed him to claim the third spot on the podium, 12.9 seconds ahead of him.
Sean Doherty (US Biathlon) crossing the finish line in sixth for the U.S. men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Saturday at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
In the final standing stage, Doherty and Austria’s Dominik Landertinger both used one spare and left the range in fifth and sixth, respectively. France dropped out of contention when Fillon Maillet had to ski a penalty lap.
“It was really exciting,” Doherty said of the last shooting in an interview with IBU TV. “The pace was really high. Came in and just tried really hard to focus on my own work, knowing there were some guys close in front and behind me. Luckily only one spare, and I was able to get out of there with staying out of the [penalty] loop.”
While Doherty left the range about three seconds ahead of Landertinger, the Austrian passed him during the first kilometer of their final loop. Landertinger extended his gap to Doherty to 12 seconds with less than half a kilometer remaining and anchored Austria to fifth (+49.2), 2.5 seconds out of fourth. Doherty finished sixth for the U.S. (+1:04.9), 15.7 seconds out of fifth.
Behind him, France’s Fillon Maillet finished seventh (+1:34.7). In all, Austria used eight spares and the U.S. had 10, but both avoided the penalty lap. France accumulated 14 spares and one penalty.
“Today’s sixth place was a very strong effort for the team,” Doherty told US Biathlon. “I am very happy to be skiing up in the mix and looking at the podium. There is still room to improve for World Championships, but it seems we are headed in the right direction.”
“Today we showed that we are competitive with the best in the world,” Bailey said in the same press release. “With 10 extra rounds, this is far from our best, but it is a big step in the right direction and exactly where we want to be heading into world champs.”
For the U.S., sixth was one place back from its team-best fifth, which it achieved with the same four men last year at the World Cup in Presque Isle, Maine.
“We are very satisfied with the result today,” Burke said. “With the exception of Lowell, it has been a bit of slow start for the rest of us with a mix of injuries and illnesses. This was definitely important for our confidence heading into World Champs.”
For every man on the team except Bailey, Saturday marked the last World Cup race before World Championships, which start Feb. 9.
Burke planned to stay in Antholz for the next two weeks to prepare.
“I feel like I am still not near my best, but at least I have been consistently in the mix the past two weeks,” Burke wrote. “Hopefully with a good training block over the next two weeks, I can still come to a higher level for World Championships.”
Bailey competed in Sunday’s 15 k mass start and finished 16th, 1:33.4 behind Norway’s Bø, who cleaned the four-stage race to win in 37:04.3. Bailey had two penalties in his last two stages (0+0+1+1), and in his first World Cup mass start, Canada’s Scott Gow finished 30th (+4:09.9) with four penalties (1+0+2+1).
The Canadian men’s relay finished 16th on Saturday (+4:13.8), with Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Macx Davies, and Brendan Green combining for two penalties and 11 spares. Both penalties came on Davies’s third leg. While the team was in 15th after Scott Gow’s second leg, they dropped to 18th on the third leg, but Green recovered two places to finish 16th.
Ben Lustgarten (Craftsbury Green Racing Project) with his $750-dollar check for winning the men’s SuperTour classic sprint on Saturday near Truckee, Calif. Stratton’s Ben Saxton (l) placed second and APU’s Reese Hanneman (r) was third.
Lustgarten, of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project, raced to a 1.58-second victory in the men’s A-final at the Auburn Ski Club in Soda Springs, Calif., finishing in 3:03.4. Ben Saxton, of the Stratton Mountain School (SMS) Elite Team, placed second, and Reese Hanneman, of Alaska Pacific University (APU), was third (+2.77).
Hannenman’s younger brother Logan also reached the final and placed fourth (+4.5), Dakota Blackhorse-von Jess (Bend Endurance Academy) was fifth (+5.86), and the third APU skier in the final, Tyler Kornfield sixth (+18.69).
Blackhorse-von Jess started the day off as the fastest qualifier in 2:58.8. Saxton qualified second, 4.1 seconds back, Logan Hanneman qualified third (+4.2), and Lustgarten fourth (+6.5). Blackhorse-von Jess went on to win his quarterfinal and place second in his semifinal, while Lustgarten and Saxton both won their quarterfinals and semifinals.
Jennie Bender (3) of the Bridger Ski Foundation leading Stratton’s Julia Kern (2) and Sun Valley’s Deedra Irwin (5) during the second women’s classic sprint semifinal at Saturday’s SuperTour near Truckee, Calif. Bender went on to win the semifinal, as well as the final.
In the women’s A-final, Jennie Bender of the Bridger Ski Foundation, coming off a classic sprint win at nationals, scored another victory in 3:29.07. She edged Craftsbury’s Kaitlynn Miller by just seven-hundredths of a second, and Stratton’s Julia Kern placed third (+3.42). Racing at home, Hannah Halvorsen (Sugar Bowl Academy) finished fourth (+3.88). Craftsbury had three in the women’s final with Caitlin Patterson in fifth (+3.93) and Heather Mooney in sixth (+27.35).
Miller proved to be the woman to beat throughout the day, winning the qualifier in 3:30.9, along with her quarterfinal and semifinal. Kern qualified second (+3.2) and Bender third (+4.6). Bender went on to win her quarterfinal and semifinal as well before facing off with Miller in the final.
NorAm Western Canadian Championships (Whistler, B.C.): 10/15 k classic
It was interval-starts day at Western Canadian Championships at Whistler Olympic Park and national-team veteran Emily Nishikawa completed the four laps of the women’s 10 k classic in 30:35.5 to win ahead of teammate Dahria Beatty, 16.5 seconds behind. Maya MacIsaac-Jones completed the national team and Alberta World Cup Academy (AWCA) sweep in third (+1:36.5).
Sovereign Lake’s Hannah Mehain, of the national junior team, was the top junior for the second-straight day in eighth overall (+3:22.1).
In the men’s 15 k, Lappe Nordic’s Andy Shields won the six-lap race in 40:34.2, showing some of the form that won him the NorAm overall last season. National-team member Jess Cockney collected his second-straight podium, finishing second, 4.3 seconds behind Shields. Evan Palmer-Charrette (NTDC Thunder Bay) completed the podium in third (+55.1).
FIS Cross-Country World Cup (Ulricehamn, Sweden): 10/15 k freestyle
The men’s 15 k freestyle podium at Saturday’s World Cup in Ulricehamn, Sweden, with Canadian winner Alex Harvey (c), Norwegian runner-up Martin Johnsrud Sundby (l), and Sweden’s Marcus Hellner (r) in third. (Photo: FIS Cross Country/Twitter)
First individual win of the season (second straight, after winning last weekend’s team sprint), fifth individual victory of his career. That’s the latest news on Canada’s Alex Harvey, who won the World Cup men’s 15-kilometer freestyle individual start on Sunday in Ulricehamn, Sweden, for his first victory in a 15 k skate race and fourth individual podium of 2016/2017.
To say Harvey is on a roll is an understatement. On Saturday, he beat Norway’s Martin Johnsrud Sundby by 6 seconds after starting a minute behind the Norwegian defending World Cup champion. Harvey’s fastest time across the line in 32:46.2 held up through 76 finishers, with Sweden’s Marcus Hellner coming somewhat within range after starting a minute behind him. Hellner ended up 14.3 seconds back from Harvey at the finish for third place, behind Sundby.
Switzerland’s Dario Cologna missed the podium by 0.5 seconds in fourth (+14.7), and Norway’s 24-year-old Daniel Stock broke through in fifth (+16.2) for his first World Cup top 20.
Great Britain’s Andrew Musgrave placed sixth (+18.7), Sweden’s Daniel Rickardsson was seventh (+25.0), Norway’s Finn Hågen Krogh eighth (+32.2), Russia’s Petr Sedov ninth (+33.9), and Japan’s Keishin Yoshida 10th (+34.2).
American Erik Bjornsen landed in the points as he tied Norway’s Simen Andreas Sveen for 28th (+1:09.2), leading fellow U.S. Ski Team members Noah Hoffman, who placed 41st (+1:28.8), and Simi Hamilton in 53rd (+1:56.2). Also for the U.S., Matt Gelso, the Period 1 SuperTour leader from the Sun Valley Ski Education Foundation (SVSEF) Gold Team, finished 68th (+3:00.3).
Harvey’s Canadian World Cup teammates Len Valjas finished 35th (+1:17.7) and Devon Kershaw 38th (+1:22.2). Knute Johnsgaard (Canadian U25 Team) did not start.
The women’s 10 k freestyle podium on Saturday in Ulricehamn, Sweden, with Norwegian winner Marit Bjørgen (c), Finland’s Krista Parmakoski (l) in second and Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla (r) in third. (Photo: FIS Cross Country/Twitter)
In her first World Cup race in over a month and at a brand-new World Cup venue, Norway’s 36-year-old Marit Bjørgen returned to her winning ways, topping the women’s 10 k freestyle on Saturday in Ulricehamn.
Bjørgen started 40th out of 61 finishers and took the lead from Finland’s Krista Parmakoski at the finish with a time of 23:46.3 minutes. Parmakoski, who started a minute ahead of her in bib 38, ended up second, 10.7 seconds back. Sweden’s Charlotte Kalla reached the podium for the second time this season in third (+24.9).
“It is always great to win,” Bjørgen said, according to an International Ski Federation (FIS) press release. “I stayed at home for five weeks and was training. It is great to come back with a victory. I know that the training I had done was good. It was an amazing atmosphere today by the course. There were people cheering everywhere.”
Norway swept fourth through sixth with Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen in fourth (+25.7), Ragnhild Haga in fifth (+32.3) and Heidi Weng in sixth (+34.0).
American Jessie Diggins raced to seventh (+34.9), ahead of Sweden’s Hanna Falk, who recorded her best distance result in eighth (+36.4). Norway’s Ingvild Flugstad Østberg finished ninth (+44.8), and Germany’s Sandra Ringwald was 10th (+56.6).
“I didn’t have the snappy good feelings I was hoping to have in my body today, but it was a solid race,” Diggins wrote in a post-race email to FasterSkier. “It’s always hard when you know that on your best days you are capable of more, but at the same time we had great skis, and it was really fun for me to be able to ski with my teammates today!”
The U.S. had three in the top 20 and four in the top 30 with Sadie Bjornsen in 12th (+1:00.5), Liz Stephen in 16th (+1:07.3) and Rosie Brennan in 24th (+1:30.7).
Cendrine Browne as Canada’s lone woman in the race achieved 35th (+1:52.0) for her career best in an individual race. Also for the U.S., Kikkan Randall placed 40th (+1:59.6) and Liz Guiney of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project 52nd (+2:33.2).
The photo finish of the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Saturday at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy, with Germany’s Simon Schempp outlunging Norway’s Emil Hegle Svendsen. (Photo: ZDF broadcast screenshot)
For the U.S. men, top six was a target for the 4 x 7.5 k relay on Sunday in Antholz, Italy, according to US Biathlon Men’s Coach Jonas Johansson.
Mission accomplished. In the final team event before 2017 World Championships, Lowell Bailey, Leif Nordgren, Tim Burke, and Sean Doherty combined for sixth, finishing 1:04.9 minutes behind the German winners. The Americans used a total of 10 spares but avoided the penalty loop, as did the Germans who used seven spares to clean the eight-stage race and won it in 1:13.57.2.
Germany’s Simon Schempp narrowly outlasted Norway’s Emil Hegle Svendsen in the finishing stretch to secure the victory for Germany (with teammates Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll and Arnd Peiffer) by one-tenth of a second. Norway finished second with nine spares and no penalties (with Lars Helge Birkeland, Henrik L’Abee-Lund, Johannes Thingnes Bø, and Svendsen), and Russia secured third (+33.6) with nine spares and zero penalties as well (with Maxim Tsvetkov, Evgeniy Garanichev, Dmitry Malyshko, and Anton Babikov).
Ukraine used a total of just five spares and had zero penalties for fourth (+46.7), and Austria took fifth (+49.2) with eight spares and no penalties, after Austria’s Dominik Landertinger skied away from Doherty on the final loop and finished 6.9 seconds ahead of him for fifth place.
For the U.S. men, sixth was close to their team-best fifth with the same lineup in last year’s World Cup relay in Presque Isle, Maine. The same group also took sixth in Ruhpolding, Germany, last year as well.
With all four making US Biathlon’s World Championships team, announced Saturday, they will likely be aiming for a best championships result early next month in Hochfilzen, Austria.
Canada (Christian Gow, Scott Gow, Macx Davies, and Brendan Green) finished 16th (+4:13.8) on Saturday with two penalties and 11 spares. Scott Gow skied them up to 15th by the second exchange but they dropped to 18th after Davies had two penalties on the third leg. With Green anchoring and using just one spare, they recouped two places before the finish.
In the women’s race, Germany’s Nadine Horchler achieved a lifetime dream with her first World Cup win, after starting in bib 30 and earning her start as a reserve athlete. Germany took first and second with Laura Dahlmeier in second, and the Czech Republic’s Gabriela Koukalova placed third. Susan Dunklee of the U.S. was the lone North American starter and finished 24th after leading at the start of the second loop.
FIS Nordic Combined World Cup (Chaux-Neuve, France): Individual large hill/10 k
Saturday’s Nordic Combined World Cup podium in Chaux-Neuve, France, with German winner Johannes Rydzek (c), German runner-up Fabian Rießle (l) and Japan’s Akito Watabe (r) in third. (Photo: FIS Nordic Combined/Twitter)
The first part of Saturday’s Nordic Combined World Cup individual large hill/10 k competition was a shining moment for U.S. Nordic Combined skier Ben Berend, who jumped to second for a total of 127.5 points, trailing only Norway’s Jarl Magnus Riiber with 139 points in Chaux-Neuve, France.
Berend flew farther than Germany’s Eric Frenzel, who jumped to third on the Chaux-Neuve large hill.
Later in the day, they started the 10 k Gundersen in that order, with Riiber heading out first, followed by Berend 46 seconds later, then Frenzel 53 seconds back in third.
Germany’s Johannes Rydzek started 1:15 minutes back in 12th and skied the fastest 10 k to take the victory at the finish (in 23:01.7). He held off his German teammate Fabian Rießle by 2.8 seconds for the win, after Rießle started sixth and 1:01 back. Japan’s Akito Watabe reached the podium in third (+5.7) after jumping to seventh and starting the race 1 second behind Rießle.
Frenzel ended up fourth (+8.3), and the fourth German in the top five, Björn Kircheisen improved to fifth (+22.6) after starting 11th.
Riiber dropped to 15th (+54.0), and Berend fell outside the top 30 to end up 32nd (+2:26.0) with the 39th-ranked course time.
Berend finished 12.2 seconds ahead of his U.S. teammate Taylor Fletcher, who placed 34th (+2:38.2) after the jump put him in 48th.
Bryan Fletcher was 49th after the jump but did not start the 10 k.
The Nordic Combined World Cup continues Sunday in Chaux-Neuve with another large hill/10 k.
Ski Classics #5: La Diagonela (Zuoz, Switzerland): 50 k classic
[UPDATED] Under “blue skies, no wind and perfect track conditions” in the Swiss Engadin Valley on Saturday, according to a Ski Classics press release, Russia’s Ilya Chernousov and the Czech Republic’s Kateřina Smutná won the men’s and women’s La Diagonela, respectively, in Zuoz, Switzerland.
Chernousov, of Team Pioneer Investments, and Tord Asle Gjerdalen (Team Santander) led a large pack of men into the final major climb on the 50 k course. There, Gjerdalen attacked and Chernousov matched him, accelerating away from his competitors up the last steep pitch to the finish, according to the press release. He finished in 2:03:39.6 hours, holding off Gjerdalen by 1.5 seconds, while Øystein Pettersen (Team BN Bank) finished third (+3.0).
In the women’s race, Smutná (Team Santander) pushed to break up the field around the halfway point, where the men caught the women. Britta Johansson Norgren (Lager 157 Ski Team) hung with Smutná, but lost contact over the last 5 k. After finishing second in the last two Ski Classics races, Smutná took the win by 1:03.2 minutes in 2:20:49.2. Nordgren finished second, ahead of Sara Lindborg (Team Serneke) in third, who finished more than three minutes later (+4:17.4).
Lowell Bailey (US Biathlon) racing to 15th in the men’s first individual IBU World Cup race of the 2016/2017 season, the 20 k individual on Thursday in Östersund, Sweden. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
Lowell Bailey is the dad of a six-month-old baby girl. Tim Burke celebrated his two-year anniversary earlier this fall. Both are US Biathlon team veterans, and at 35 and 34 years old, respectively, they’re still lighting up the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup.
The teammates and training partners, based out of Lake Placid, N.Y., finished one place and 2.1 seconds apart on Thursday, with Bailey ending up 15th and Burke 16th in the first men’s individual World Cup race of the season: the 20-kilometer individual in Östersund, Sweden.
While Bailey accumulated four penalties in the four-stage race, he posted the 11th-fastest overall range and shooting times out of 103 finishers, and his course time ranked 25th overall.
“Your ski speed is always a little bit of an unknown going into the first race of the season,” Bailey said, according to a US Biathlon press release. “I’m happy to start off with decent ski speed and I hope I can build on this race going forward from here. I’ve worked throughout the training session on increasing the speed in the shooting setup (before any shots are fired) so I’m happy to see the overall range time where it is.”
It was another windy day in Östersund, without a single racer hitting all 20 targets. The 10th starter and reigning overall World Cup champion, Martin Fourcade of France, took the individual win in 51:33.8 with two misses (0+2+0+0). He held off Norway’s Johannes Thingnes Bø (the 15th starter) by 29.5 seconds. Bø cleaned three-straight stages, but two penalties on the last standing cost him the win (0+0+0+2) and he settled for second.
The men’s 20 k individual podium in the first IBU World Cup of the 2016/2017 season, with winner Martin Fourcade (c) of France, Norway’s Johannes Bø (l) in second and Vladimir Chepelin (r) of Belarus on the podium for the first time in third. (Photo: IBU/BiathlonWorld.com)
“I knew I had the chance with 15 hits after the first three stages, but there was so much wind,” Bø told German TV broadcaster ARD. “I just tried to fight hard. but not hard enough. Two misses and I lost the first place. That was not so good, but the three first [stages] and overall it was a good race.“
Meanwhile, Vladimir Chepelin of Belarus was one of three finishers with just one miss (1+0+0+0), and he finished third (1:24.3 behind Fourcade) for his first World Cup podium, despite clocking the 43rd-ranked course time.
Germany’s Florian Graf, who started 94th, was on track for a podium with three clean stages, but one miss on the last standing put him in eighth at the finish (+2:33.6).
“In our hotel room, we joked about skiing in the top ten and shooting clean,” Graf told ARD. “Of course I would not have expected that it works out so well today, but I am overjoyed to have such a debut.”
Norway had three finish in the top five with Lars Helge Birkeland in fourth (+2:10.5, three misses) and Ole Einar Bjørndalen in fifth (+2:16.7, three misses).
But the main story of the day was once again Fourcade, who, like Bailey, is also a dad.
Asked what was more important, his life with his 14-month-old daughter or winning the first individual race of the season, Fourcade replied, “If I say the victory my wife would probably kill me. Or my daughter would kill me in a few years, too. So yeah, you can’t compare. Biathlon is my passion, is my job, but my daughter is my life now. Nothing to compare,” he told ARD.
In terms of the race itself, he said he was pleased.
“It was a long preparation and this was a good answer about my shape after the test in Sjusjøen and the win in single mixed [relay],” Fourcade said after his second win in as many races this season, and 48th individual World Cup victory (50 including two Olympic golds in 2014). “There is a difference with being able to win and actually winning, so I am very happy.”
And then there was the question of whether his main goal is a sixth overall World Cup title.
“That is what I trained for, that is what I hope I will get,” Fourcade said. “But this is biathlon. Today I had a good form with challenging wind conditions, but you can also lose quickly. It’s just one race, and there are about 30 more coming. I am very happy about today. I will enjoy this victory, my 50th World Cup victory. That is something I wouldn’t have dreamed about and I will enjoy it today.”
In bib 18, Bailey started directly behind Chepelin, the third-place finisher, and cleaned both prone stages, but missed two on each standing bout.
“It was pretty gusty in the range and you really had to concentrate on making quality shots,” Bailey told US Biathlon. “I’m happy with the prone performance but definitely wish I could have a few of those standing shots back.”
US Biathlon’s Tim Burke (27) racing to 16th in the men’s first individual IBU World Cup race of the 2016/2017 season, the 20 k individual on Thursday in Östersund, Sweden. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
Burke in bib 27 started off with a clean prone as well, followed by two standing misses then another clean prone. In the final stage, he had one more penalty for a total of three (0+2+0+1) and finished 2.1 seconds back from Bailey, 3:54.6 behind Fourcade, and 0.2 seconds ahead of 19th-place Ondrej Moravec of the Czech Republic.
Burke has tallied three podiums in Östersund, most recently in 2013/2014, when he placed third in a sprint. In 2009/2010, he finished second in an 20 k there and third in the sprint.
“I’m not really sure why Östersund has been a good venue for me,” he told US Biathlon. “Maybe it’s because of the tricky shooting conditions, which is something that I typically like. Unfortunately, I felt really flat on the course today. I should have been able to reach the top 10 today with that shooting, but I just did not have it on the tracks today. Hopefully my legs will rebound for Saturday’s sprint.”
On Thursday, he made a point to shoot slower than usual in the windy conditions. His range time ranked 31st overall.
“I decided to just take my time on the range and that worked out today,” Burke said.
Also for the U.S., Russell Currier, who qualified for World Cup starts less than a week ago in an IBU Cup sprint, finished 54th (+7:04.5) with six penalties (1+1+2+2).
Nathan Smith led the Canadians in 43rd (+5:36.8) with three penalties (1+0+1+1). Among his teammates, Scott Gow finished 60th (+7:30.4, five misses), Macx Davies was 62nd (+7:34.6, four misses), Brendan Green was 89th (+10:20.1, eight misses), and Christian Gow 99th (+12:52.8, eight misses).
Norway won the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Saturday at the IBU World Cup in Presque Isle, Maine, with (from left to right) Lars Helge Birkeland, Johannes Thingnes Bø, Tarjei Bø, and Erlend Bjøntegaard. Sean Doherty (far right) anchored the U.S. to fifth, its best result since 2013. (Photo: IBU/NordicFocus)
Note: This article has been updated to include comments from Lowell Bailey.
It’s often a tall order being the anchor leg in a relay, but that kind of pressure is what most closers thrive on. Take Tarjei Bø, for example. The 27-year-old Norwegian had been sent out in first after the final exchange, after his younger brother Johannes Thingnes Bø tagged him two-tenths of a second ahead of Russia in the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay in Presque Isle, Maine.
It was the final day of the IBU World Cup in the U.S., and the last day of World Cup racing before World Championships March 2-13 in Oslo, Norway. For the Norwegians, this was it; Tarjei had three loops and two shooting stages to see what he could do to hold off Russia, as well as France, 13.4 seconds back, to take the win.
Italy trailed 25.6 seconds behind in fourth and the U.S. was another 12 seconds back in fifth at the start of the last leg. For the Americans, Lowell Bailey, Leif Nordgren and Tim Burke had used a combined six spares and avoided the penalty lap to reach as high as fourth during Nordgren’s second leg, and with Sean Doherty closing, they were within 25 seconds of the podium with 7.5 k to go.
Sean Doherty (US Biathlon) skied the anchor leg for the U.S. in the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay on Saturday at the IBU World Cup in Presque Isle, Maine. The U.S. placed fifth for the best team result since 2013. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
But before we get ahead of ourselves and the historic third or fourth place the Americans were eyeing, let’s get back to the race between Norway and Russia.
One and a half kilometers into the last leg, Tarjei remained 2.6 seconds ahead of Russia’s 24-year-old Maxim Tsvetkov, and extended that lead to 7 seconds half a kilometer later.
In his first prone stage, Tarjei hit all five targets, while Tsvetkov needed two spares to clean. France’s Jean Guillaume Beatrix cleaned with the fastest shooting and range time on that stage, moving into second, 26.7 seconds behind the Norwegian with two loops to go.
Tsvetkov left the range in third, 46.7 seconds out of first, while Doherty improved to fourth — another 14 seconds back — with one spare. Meanwhile, Germany’s Benedikt Doll used one spare as well to move into fifth, 10 seconds behind Doherty, and Italy’s Thomas Bormolini needed three spares to clean and fell to sixth.
Tarjei took his lead and ran with it, opening up 35 seconds on Beatrix in second place by 4.5 k. The Norwegian entered the range for the last time without anyone in sight, hitting his first four targets then needing one spare to clean. Beatrix again shot without a miss to secure second place, heading out on the last loop 14 seconds behind Norway.
One spare for the Russian kept him in third, 47 seconds out of first, and Germany’s Doll left the range 10.7 seconds later in fourth with a single spare. Just 2.4 seconds behind, Doherty followed in fifth, after using two spares to clean the final stage.
For Tarjei, the last 2 k was more or less a victory lap as he remained nearly 27 seconds ahead with 1 k to go. He crossed the finish without anyone else in sight, securing the Norwegian win in 1:12:09.8. France’s Beatrix finished 30.1 seconds later in second, while a fight for third unfolded behind them on the final loop.
Initially, Doll led Doherty out of the range, then attacked early in the loop while a US Biathlon staff member ran alongside Doherty to encourage him to latch on. But Doll, who recently placed second in the mass start at the World Cup in Canmore, Alberta, was on a mission for the podium — and he needed to drop Doherty and catch Tsvetkov to reach it. He overtook the Russian by the 6.5 k mark, skiing 2 seconds ahead of Tsvetkov while Doherty followed in fifth,, 4.6 seconds behind Tsvetkov.
At the finish, Doll remained in control of third, crossing the line 42.6 seconds behind Norway, while Tsvetkov and Doherty duked it out for fourth. The Russian took it in a photo finish, 48.3 seconds back, and Doherty finished with the same time in fifth.
“Today’s race was a great result for me individually and for the team as a whole,” Doherty said in a US Biathlon press release. “I felt strong on the skis and the finish was so close. I think we are all feeling optimistic for the upcoming worlds in Norway.”
In all, the U.S. finished with nine spares and no penalties, and captured its best result in a men’s relay since 2013. In January, the same lineup placed sixth in the men’s relay in Ruhpolding, Germany. Fourth would have been an unprecedented team best.
“The relay was a great indicator of where we are as a team right now,” Bailey wrote in an email.
Norway, with Lars Helge Birkeland, Erlend Bjøntegaard, and the Bø brothers, combined for first with seven spares and no penalties. They overcame a rough start when Birkeland used three spares on the first prone stage and dropped to 16th in the field. He cleaned standing to improve to 11th, then came through the first exchange in 12th.
“The relay is important for us, especially before the world champs, we wanted to win to have a good feeling,” Tarjei told German broadcaster ARD after the race. “The whole team had two or three misses too many, we didn’t know what would happen, but a really good job.”
Germany stood in first after the opening leg, with Erik Lesser hitting all 10 targets without a miss and handing off to Andreas Birnbacher 17 seconds ahead of Switzerland in second. Serafin Wiestner had elevated the Swiss team with the fastest course time of the first-leg skiers, using one spare in each stage to bring them within striking distance of Germany. Belarus followed just 0.7 seconds behind in third, after Vladimir Chepelin cleaned prone and used one spare in standing. France’s Simon Fourcade came through the exchange a second later in fifth, 18.8 seconds behind Germany.
American Lowell Bailey (r) leads Norway’s Lars Helge Birkeland during the first leg of the men’s 4 x 7.5 k relay at the IBU World Cup in Presque Isle, Maine. The Norwegians went on to win and the U.S. placed fifth for its best result since 2013. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
For the U.S., Bailey tagged Nordgren in 11th, 39 seconds out of first and 11.6 seconds ahead of Norway in 12th. Bailey used one spare in prone and two in standing to leave the range in sixth, then 12th, respectively.
“I didn’t have an especially great day, but the rest of the guys had solid performances and brought us back up into legitimate contention for a bronze,” Bailey wrote.
Canada’s Scott Perras cleaned prone to follow Bailey out of the range for the first time in seventh, then used three spares in standing and slipped to 13th, more than a minute behind the leaders.
At the exchange, Perras tagged Carsen Campbell in 14th, 1:15 back. Campbell improved to 13th, using one spare in each stage, and Matthew Neumann used five spares (three in prone, two standing) to slip one spot to 14th, but the Canadians were taken out of the race on the final loop when Matthew Hudec was lapped. Hudec used just one spare in prone but incurred a penalty loop after using all three in standing, making the team total 14 spares and one penalty.
At the front of the race, Switzerland took control on the second leg with Benjamin Weger, who cleaned prone and used one spare in standing. Italy moved into second, 33.4 seconds back after Lukas Hofer used three spares (one prone, two standing) and skied the second-fastest course time of the second leg.
Alexander Povarnitsyn put Russia in third, 38.4 seconds behind, with a clean prone and single standing spare, and Germany fell to fifth when Birnbacher used all three spares in prone and two more in standing.
“I really have no explanation for my prone shooting,” Birnbacher told German broadcaster ARD. “I somehow felt I had hit, but… Then I clicked after the second or third miss, by right, because the wind was a little coming from there. In zeroing it was kind of the same. So this is pretty inexplicable.”
Temperatures were frigid in Presque Isle on Saturday morning, around -22 degrees Fahrenheit, which warmed up to about 8 degrees by the 2:20 p.m. start. Windchill was still a factor, and some athletes, like Perras, skied with mittens over their gloves to keep their hands warm for shooting.
Leif Nordgren (US Biathlon raced the second leg for the U.S. men’s relay on Saturday, bringing the team from 11th to seventh by the second exchange at the IBU World Cup in Presque Isle, Maine. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
“I like racing in the cold weather,” Nordgren, the Americans’ second-leg skier, wrote in an email. “I think as North Americans that’s something that we get used to growing up, and have an advantage over central Europeans maybe.”
He rose from 11th at the exchange to seventh with a flawless prone stage, then left the range in fourth after standing, where he used one spare.
“I was pretty happy with my race today, I tried to be aggressive and attack right from the start, with my shape I’ve had this season that is the only way I’m able to hang in the race,” Nordgren wrote. “I was so disappointed with my shooting after the sprint race, I just made sure to follow my shooting plan and it paid off. Getting the tag from Lowell in 11th, I knew that with good shooting would be the best chance I had of moving up.”
In Thursday’s sprint, Nordgren placed 65th with 7-for-10 shooting. On his final loop on Saturday, he slipped three places (behind France, Norway and Germany) to seventh, tagging Burke 55.8 seconds out of first and 4.3 seconds behind Germany in sixth.
“It was too bad that I ran out of gas on the final loop, it would have been nice to put Tim in a better position, but I gave all I had with my shape for today,” Nordgren wrote.
Switzerland dropped out of contention when 25-year-old Mario Dolder failed to cleaned prone with three spares and had to ski a penalty loop. That put him in fifth, then he used all three spares again and incurred another penalty in standing to slip to eighth. He tagged Swiss anchor Martin Jaeger nearly 1:50 minutes back in eighth.
Norway moved from fifth to first with Norway’s J.T. Bø, who had been tagged 51 seconds out of first and came within 19 seconds of the lead in fourth after prone (using two spares to clean). In standing, he used one spare and left the range in second, 6.3 seconds behind Russia’s Dmitry Malyshko, who had cleaned the stage and used one spare previously in prone.
Behind Norway and Russia, which ultimately came through the last exchange in first and second, France picked off one place to tag in third, ahead of Italy and the U.S.
France put together the most consistent race of the day, after Simon Fourcade tagged Quentin Fillon Maillet in fourth, then he held that position to hand off to Simon Desthieux in fourth, 48 seconds out of first.
Desthieux shot without a miss to elevate the team to third, 13.4 seconds behind Norway with one leg to go.
Tim Burke (US Biathlon) racing the third leg for the U.S. in the men’s relay on Saturday at the IBU World Cup in Presque Isle, Maine. He brought the team from seventh to fifth by the final exchange. (Photo: USBA/NordicFocus)
Meanwhile, Burke used a spare in each stage to bring the U.S. from seventh to fifth, with the fourth-fastest course time of the third leg.
Doherty skied the fourth-fastest anchor leg, behind Austria’s Julian Eberhard (who anchored his team to ninth), Doll and Bø, respectively.
“It was good to make a win in the last race,” Tarjei Bø said. “Now we have two weeks at home…”
Switzerland’s Jaeger was lapped and his team ended up 13th, ahead of Canada in 15th.
When ARD asked the Germans how they would spend their last day in Presque Isle before heading home, the team’s third leg, Daniel Böhm responded, “We have planned our day front to back, we basically don’t know how we’ll get everything done,” he said with a laugh. “No, Walmart I think is closed on Sundays, so it will be difficult to get through the day. I think it will come down to surfing on the internet, reading, and maybe playing some cards.”
Nordgren wrote that he’ll fly to Germany on Sunday for a week of “easy training” before World Championships. The rest of the U.S. team could not be immediately reached for comment.
Teammates in the single mixed relay on Sunday, France’s Martin Fourcade and Marie Dorin Haber after winning the first of two relays on the last day of the IBU World Cup in Canmore, Alberta. (Photo: Daniel S. Guay)
France was determined to win the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup 13.5-kilometer single mixed relay on Sunday in Canmore, Alberta, using their best athletes with men’s overall World Cup leader Martin Fourcade and Marie Dorin Habert, who ranks third in the women’s standings. And they succeeded in convincing fashion, finishing first in 37:58.0 minutes, with four spares and no penalties.
The first time the new race format was on the calendar this season at the World Cup in Östersund, Sweden, the French duo of Dorin Habert and Martin’s older brother Simon Fourcade thought they had won the race, but because Fourcade had not fired a shot during the competition the team was slapped with a four-minute penalty, putting them back to 21st place.
On Sunday morning, France made no such mistakes and didn’t leave the other teams any chance in nearly a start-to-finish victory. Dorin Habert took the lead out of the arena, stayed there for most of her leg and tagged narrowly in first place, before both Fourcade and Dorin Habert expanded their lead on the next three legs with good shooting and fast skiing. Fourcade put an exclamation mark on the victory by sprinting into the finish despite knowing he had a comfortable lead of more than half a minute on the final loop.
“It was a really exciting race. I like these kind of short races. I tried to be as strong as Martin, it’s an honor to run with him,” Dorin Habert said at the post-race press conference. “It was in our head before the competition to win, but this is biathlon and everything can happen on the [shooting range].
“I tried to train the finish, I think that was a good opportunity,” Fourcade explained during the press conference. “But I actually didn’t compete the full last loop,” he added with a smile. “I only did for some parts, the ones in front of the TV.”
“Today I was satisfied even if I needed two extra shots, two too much,” Fourcade later told the IBU in an interview. “It was a good competition for both of us.”
France’s Martin Fourcade (l) tags teammate Marie Dorin Habert for her the third of four legs in the single mixed relay at the IBU World Cup in Canmore, Alberta. They ended up winning by 45 seconds. (Photo: Daniel S. Guay)
Second place went to the Austrian duo Lisa Therese Hauser and Simon Eder, 45.2 seconds back, with eight spares and no penalties. It was Hauser’s first World Cup podium.
Norway’s Hilde Fenne and Lars Helge Birkeland secured the third spot on the podium, 55.3 seconds back, with seven spares and no penalties. Birkeland defended his lead on the final loop, coming into the finish two seconds ahead of Russia’s Olga Podchufarova, who teamed up with Alexey Volkov to finish fourth (+57.3), with no penalties and just two spares.
New since the 2014/2015 season and only held for the third time at the World Cup level on Sunday, the single mixed format was established by the IBU to have another action-packed event and give “smaller” biathlon nations a shot at the podium. For some countries, it presented an opportunity to start a team event. It is not yet a part of Biathlon World Championships or Olympic Games.
“The single mixed relay is interesting for smaller nations, because they maybe don’t have five women and five men who can compete with the top, but maybe one or two,” Canadian head coach Matthias Ahrens told German TV broadcaster ZDF in an interview before the race. “Then you can use those in the mixed or single mixed relay, thereby potentially getting a chance to reach the podium, which worked pretty well for us at the season-opening in Östersund [where Canada placed second].”
On Sunday, some teams, such as France — though not an example for a “small” biathlon nation — Austria and Latvia (in eighth place), made use of that by putting their best racers in the event. Other teams decided to focus on the “normal” mixed relay, with two women and two men on each team, that followed later on Sunday in Canmore.
The single mixed relay features the shortest loops in biathlon, with the athletes skiing a 1.5-kilometer loop between each shooting stage, then immediately exchanging after the standing shooting. After the female team member starts and shoots one prone and one standing stage, she exchanges to her male teammate, then the woman gets tagged again to ski the third leg (six kilometers total), and the man closes out on the fourth anchor leg racing an additional 1.5 k after the final standing shooting, which adds up to the odd 13.5 k distance. The athletes are allowed to use three spare rounds per shooting like in a normal relay, and the penalty lap is also shortened to 75 meters (usually 150).
Thus the whole race is extremely fast-paced, and rather resembles a cross-country team sprint than a traditional biathlon or cross-country relay.
“This was a new start for me in the World Cup, because I never did a single mixed relay before,” Fourcade said at the press conference. “I already did it a lot during the show competitions like Schalke [World Team Challenge in late December] or Moscow or Tyumen [Race of Champions, another invitational at the end of the season]. I really love that. But it was different today … with the pressure of the World Cup… I think the single mixed relay is really good for biathlon.”
“The single mixed relay is a super fun race format, but you really have to shoot well to have a chance,” U.S. Biathlon’s Annelies Cook wrote in an email.
“Certain abilities are demanded, especially ‘shooting efficiency,’ ” Ahrens told ZDF. “That means you need athletes who, first of all, can shoot well and hit, but also shoot very fast.”
Germany’s Luise Kummer (2), Norway’s Hilde Fenne (1) and Canada’s Julia Ransom (3) early in the single mixed relay at the IBU World Cup in Canmore, Alberta. Norway went on to place third, Germany seventh and Canada finished 12th. (Photo: Daniel S. Guay)
Conditions on Sunday were good throughout the race, with calm winds and the sun shining in the Canadian Rocky Mountains, after the athletes had struggled with snowfall and strong gales in the previous days.
“I think we were all satisfied to know that it would be fair and beautiful conditions. It’s the [kind of] biathlon we love,” Fourcade said in an interview with the IBU.
“Today was the best snow conditions of the week. There was a light wind, but it seemed pretty consistent,” Canada’s Nathan Smith wrote in an email.
France steadily expanded its lead throughout the race. At the first exchange, Dorin Habert tagged Fourcade in first, just 0.4 seconds ahead of Sweden. Fourcade slightly expanded that lead to 6.5 seconds over Russia in second place by the next exchange, and then Dorin Habert cleaned both shooting stages on her second leg to balloon the gap to 50.1 seconds over Norway in second. Essentially, Fourcade just needed to go through the motions on his last leg to lock up first.
Before the final shooting, Germany’s Erik Lesser had been in second place behind Fourcade. But unable to clean his targets and running out of spares, Lesser incurred a penalty lap and ended up seventh (+1:29.6), as teams passed him with better shooting. Lesser and teammate Luise Kummer combined for one penalty and eight spares.
This brought back some painful memories from the first time a single mixed relay was held in a year ago in February 2015 in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic. Lesser and Kummer had been in the lead before the final shooting, then Lesser slipped into fourth with a penalty.
After Sunday’s race, suffice to say Lesser wasn’t happy.
“Does anyone still want to see that? I don’t!” Lesser quipped when the interviewer in the mixed zone asked him to take a look at a replay of his targets in the final shooting stage. “It really doesn’t matter where those [shots] went, I just didn’t hit, fired four really poor shots,” he added after taking a glance at the fairly close misses. “If Mark [Kirchner, men’s head coach] wants to chew me out for that, I hard-earned it.”
“On the first spare I was already thinking, ‘Oh great, this is going the same way as last year,’ ” Lesser continued. “On the second leg I struggled, I tried to keep the others at bay on the course so they would not catch up, but I somehow didn’t move well, got tense on the shooting range, and then the misses happened. I am completely annoyed, mega-disappointed… This is the World Cup level, so you should also be able to hit with tired legs.”
Kummer used four spares and was also disappointed, but didn’t pin the blame on Lesser.
“A [single mixed] relay is comprised of two people, everything has to work out, and that mistake can happen to everybody,” she told ZDF. “You are always happy yourself to get through [a relay shooting stage] unscathed, so that shouldn’t be a problem…. I still think it’s a very exciting competition for the spectators, very fast-paced exchanges. It doesn’t have the same standing as a relay or mixed relay yet, but one can see that it is developing.”
Lesser’s troubles allowed Austria’s quick-shooting Eder to pass him and secure second place, after he and Hauser had been just outside the podium ranks for most of the race.
“I am really happy about this podium today. It’s my first one. I dreamed about it, and today it worked,” the 22-years-old Hauser told reporters at the press conference. “My shooting was not so good especially in prone. Simon and I are both fast shooters and also good shooters, but today it was not the best.”
“I felt great on the course, I always could keep up or even close gaps,” Hauser added in an Austrian Ski Federation press release. “On the shooting range I let the stress get to me a little bit, that caused the spares. But of course I am overjoyed by the podium finish.”
“The first turn did not go according to plan on the shooting range. I had problems with my ski poles and used too many spares,” Eder, 32, said in the press release. “But the second turn went all the better, I could really push the tempo also on the shooting range. Finally we have a place on the podium also in a mixed relay.”
In the absence of their usual stars that are skipping the North American World Cups in the leadup to 2016 World Championships at home in Oslo, the Norwegians still reached the podium with Fenne and Birkeland, who both improved on their second legs to move from seventh at the first exchange to third at the finish. (Birkeland also won the first single mixed race of the season, though with Kaia Woeien Nicolaisen as his partner.)
“I am not sure why, we just always try to do good races,” Fenne said during the post-race press conference when asked why Norway seems to do so well in the single mixed relay. She added that the coaching staff picked the lineups for Sunday, so she didn’t know why she was put on the single mixed relay instead of the four-person mixed relay.
Canada 12th, U.S. 16th
Representing Canada at home in Canmore, Julia Ransom, who is competing in her first full World Cup season, teamed up with veteran Nathan Smith, who raced to second in the Östersund single mixed relay with Rosanna Crawford.
Canada’s Nathan Smith (behind) coming through the exchange zone to tag teammate Julia Ransom during single mixed relay at the IBU World Cup in Canmore, Alberta. (Photo: Daniel S. Guay)
This time, the Canadians ended up nearly two minutes off the podium in 12th (+1:54.3), with 10 spares and no penalties.
On her first leg, Ransom used one spare round in her first prone, but then required all three spares in standing to narrowly avoid a penalty lap.
“It was hard, very hard,” Ransom said in a Biathlon Canada press release. “I haven’t done that format before. I felt that one for sure. This is the first time I’ve done a relay with Nathan so it was lot of fun for me, and a great experience.
“I was bouncing around at the start and maybe nerves got to me a little bit because I didn’t know what to expect,” she added. “The techs just told me to ‘reel it in.’ ”
After the first 1.5 k, she tagged Smith 47.0 seconds behind in 19th of 23 teams. On his first leg, Smith cleaned prone without any spares and only required one spare in standing to keep his distance to the top, handing off to Ransom 49.2 seconds back in 11th.
“We unfortunately fell back pretty early in the race. Julia had some difficulty in the range,” Smith wrote in an email to FasterSkier. “The time lost loading spares is even more penalizing when the loops are so short. The format itself is pretty fun to race, and quite a bit different from traditional races. It’s almost more like two races back to back with a little break. It suits my quick shooting speed really well.”
Ransom cleaned her next prone stage as she had done repeatedly in recent weeks, but with two more spares in standing, she lost a minute to the top.
Still in 11th when he received the tag, Smith again hit all targets in his prone stage, but required three spares in his last standing to avoid the penalty lap, approximately holding his gap to the leaders.
“Other than my last standing my [two relay] legs went really well. Prone felt amazing. Probably almost the best ever. Just fast, easy and accurate,” Smith wrote. “I ended up battling a lot with [Latvia’s] Rastorgujevs. He surprised me by matching my shooting speed. He’s always one of the fastest out there. It was too much for me to hang on to on the last lap.”
“It was my best race this week. The legs felt a lot better today. Not amazing, but quite good until that last lap,” Smith said in the team press release. “One of the toughest things to do is race at home with the pressure we put on ourselves with our friends and family watching all the volunteers we know out here. I obviously wanted to peak here and do well but there are so many factors that come into play. It was a great experience racing at home that we’ll be able to take with us.”
For the U.S., Cook teamed up with Leif Nordgren. In Östersund, their teammates, Clare Egan and Sean Doherty finished 15th in the single mixed relay. This time, the Americans finished in the same range in 16th place (+3:20.1), with one penalty and 14 spares.
Annelies Cook (US Biathlon) during one of her two standing stages in Sunday’s single mixed relay at the IBU World Cup in Canmore, Alberta. She teamed up with Leif Nordgren to place 16th. (Photo: Daniel S. Guay)
After using just one spare in her first prone stage, Cook incurred a penalty in her first standing stage, quickly disappearing out of the focus of the TV cameras, tagging Nordgren in 20th, about 1:05 behind the leaders.
“I felt good on skis and was in the mix, but I had a hard time holding back in the skiing and was probably breathing too hard to shoot well in standing,” Cook wrote in an email. Her course time ranked seventh fastest of the first-leg skiers. “My penalty in standing took us too far from the top to have contact.”
Nordgren needed two spare rounds in prone and another one in standing, losing about another 30 seconds to the top teams on his leg (+1:41.3) as he tagged Cook in 18th.
“This format is for sure a little different than a typical relay,” Nordgren explained in an email. “The pace is usually fast right from the start, and because the loops are so short it really puts all the focus on the shooting since its hard to really break away on such a short loop. It’s nice to have that difference, but you really have to be on top of your game in the shooting to be competitive.”
On her second leg, Cook again emerged from prone with just one spare, but needed another three spare rounds to clean her final standing stage and avoid another penalty. When she exchanged back to Nordgren, the U.S. was 3:04.7 out of first in 20th.
“The race does feel like a cross country sprint. But what makes it hard is knowing that you still have to hit targets, and finding the balance between all out sprinting and going just at the level where you can manage to hit your targets is tricky,” Cook wrote. “I just tried to make up time lost on the range by catching up on skiing as best as I could. There were a few of us together each lap, so it felt like a competition between that group of people.
“I had a hard time holding back because I really love sprinting, and that probably kept me from hitting in standing,” she added. “That put Leif on a position where he had to try and chase people down. He did a really good job of that and I was proud of him for catching people in the last loop.”
On the anchor leg, Nordgren mirrored his performance from his first round, again requiring two spares in prone and one in standing, but only lost 15 more seconds to the leaders and leapt to 16th by overtaking Romania, Slovenia, Belarus and Finland.
“Today neither Annelies nor I really had a great day on the range so we had a hard time to stay with the top teams,” Nordgren concluded. “The tracks were in perfect shape today which is always nice. Our techs did a great job to give us fast material, but we weren’t able to put it to good use.”
Staying Warm
In the exchange zone, several teams could be seen using spinning bikes to keep warm and stay loose during their race breaks while their teammate was out on the course, something the Norwegians pioneered for the single mixed relay in Östersund, though the Americans and Canadians opted for a traditional warmup.
“I just ran around to keep warm,” Cook wrote. “It’s not a big break and we don’t have a team bike. But running was totally fine for me.”
“During the break both of us just opted to jog around, being that it’s such a short race, it’s more important to stay warm any way possible,” Nordgren wrote. “Today was the first day in a several that the wind was pretty low, so that made staying warm a little easier.”
“I just jogged around while Julia was doing her second leg,” Smith explained in his email. “I considered using a spin bike but decided it would be best to practice like at World Champs.”
Moving on to Presque Isle
Nathan Smith (Biathlon Canada) during Sunday’s single mixed relay at the IBU World Cup in Canmore, Alberta. He teamed up with Julia Ransom to place 12th. (Photo: Daniel S. Guay)
The IBU World Cup now moves east to Presque Isle, Maine, with sprints for the women and men on Thursday, followed by pursuit races on Friday, and traditional relays on Saturday (men) and Sunday (women).
“Today was the best I’ve felt in a couple weeks. I hope my shape continues to return to normal through Presque Isle,” Smith wrote.
While Smith continues to work to hold his own in the overall World Cup standings (he’s currently 19th), the rest of Canada’s A-team, those pre-qualified for World Championships, will skip the Presque Isle World Cup and train in Canmore until Feb. 22, according to Crawford. That includes Crawford, Ransom, Sarah Beaudry, Brendan Green, Scott Gow, Christian Gow, and Macx Davies.
Smith and a women’s contingent of Emma Lunder, Zina Kocher, Audrey Vaillancourt, and Erin Yungblut will head to Maine, and after those races, the Canadian team will select its fourth woman for World Championships.
“I think we’re … looking forward to racing next week on home soil in Presque Isle,” Nordgren wrote on behalf of the U.S. team. “I haven’t raced there for about 5 years, so it will be fun to be back!”
In the four-person mixed relay that followed Sunday afternoon, the U.S. notched a team-best fourth with Susan Dunklee, Hannah Dreissigacker, Tim Burke, and Lowell Bailey, while Canada tied its previous best of sixth, with Crawford, Beaudry, Davies, and Green. Stay tuned for a separate report.
Note: Presumably due to a software bug, the IBU’s competition analysis report for the single mixed relay contained erroneous ranks for data such as course and shooting times, with higher numbers than the 23 teams that started in this race, so no such information was used for this article.
Russia’s Anton Shipulin (l) celebrates after holding off Germany’s Simon Schempp (r) to anchor Russia to the men’s relay victory on Sunday at the IBU World Cup in Antholz, Italy. Shipulin outlasted Schempp by 1 second for the win. (Photo: IBU/Rene Miko)
Russia’s Anton Shipulin and Germany’s Simon Schempp have met multiple times on the final loop of an International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup race and duked it out for first, both in individual races as well as relays. In fact, they did so in Saturday’s pursuit in Antholz, Italy, where Shipulin prevailed by 10 seconds to claim his first victory of the season.
On Sunday in the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay in the same packed arena with over 20,000 biathlon fans, Shipulin did it again to anchor a Russian team — with Maxim Tsvetkov, Evgeny Garanichev and Dmitry Malyshko — to first in 1:12:24.8, with no penalties and seven spare rounds.
The German team, with Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll, Arnd Peiffer, and Schempp, finished just 1 second behind, with one penalty but just four spares.
“It has become sort of a tradition with me and Simon together on the last shooting range and then on the last lap,” Shipulin commented in the post-race press conference through a translator. “Honestly Simon becomes stronger and stronger every time, but today I would say I didn’t beat him physically, it was more about tactics. It is not a very long finish lane here, so I just made it tactically better to not give him a chance.”
“Being on the podium shows that we are in good shape,” Malyshko said through a translator. “We will try our best at the World Championships [in Oslo in March] to show everybody that we are even stronger than in the World Cups.”
“We trust in Anton, and Anton believes in the team,” one of Shipulin’s teammates added in an interview with the IBU.
Schempp was not pleased with a situation that happened when he and Shipulin came into the arena, having to pass a lapped athlete from Japan just before the last turn, with Shipulin overtaking on the right but Schempp getting slightly blocked.
“The lapped athlete ran in the middle of the track. The whole audience was yelling for him to go to the side. I don’t know, maybe he is deaf on his ears, or whatever he is doing,” Schempp told German broadcaster ARD. “With all the peace of mind he is running right between us, and that must not happen.”
Asked if he thought a protest with the IBU would be an option, Schempp replied: “Nah, surely that would not go through. That result stands.”
“I gave everything I had, it was a neat relay, and we were rewarded with the second place,” he added. “The Russians were very, very strong, especially Anton in the finish. We can live with that. It was a clear step forward in the relays [the German men’s first relay podium of the season]. Of course the end is a little annoying, but we can be satisfied.”
The head coaches for German and Russia, Mark Kirchner and Ricco Gross, respectively, hugged and congratulated each other in the coaching zone after the race. Both 45 years old, they are former German teammates and won gold together in the men’s relay at the 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway. More recently, they were also colleagues, with Kirchner coaching the German men’s team and Gross being an assistant for the women at the 2014 Olympics, before Gross took an offer last summer to lead the Russian men’s team (after being “demoted” to the IBU Cup by the German Ski Federation).
“It’s difficult to even pick the six best athletes for the World Cup,” Gross had told German newspaper FAZ in an interview published on Friday, just before Shipulin’s sprint victory. “I was extremely surprised in September when I watched the Russian championships for the first time, with more than 100 athletes. There is a giant talent pool … My target is the Olympic Games in 2018.”
Norway opted to rest its usual starters Tarjei Bø and Emil Hegle Svendsen for the relay on Sunday, instead starting veteran Ole Einar Bjørndalen, Lars Helge Birkeland, Johannes Thingnes Bø, and Erlend Bjøntegaard.
“They married and went on vacation,” Johannes Bø joked during the press conference when asked about the absence of his brother Tarjei and Svendsen.
Thus it fell to the relatively inexperienced Bjøntegaard to anchor the team. Bø tagged him with a 29.2-second lead over Russia, and 33.5 seconds ahead of Germany, with Shipulin and Schempp chasing after him.
“Now it’s becoming really exciting. I wouldn’t like to be in the shoes of Bjøntegaard right now,” Germany’s third-leg Arnd Peiffer said during an interview with ARD while the race was still going on. “I think he has a lot of stress now, and I am curious what happens.”
But facing this big challenge, Bjøntegaard did a good job skiing a fast first loop to return to the range still in first and only needing two spares in his prone shooting. Yet this still reduced his lead to 6.8 seconds over Schempp, who had shot clean, and 14.9 seconds to Shipulin, who required one spare.
In the final standing shooting, the Norwegian needed two more spare rounds, while Shipulin and Schempp both remained clean and left the range just 0.5 seconds apart. They skied together until the finishing sprint, with Bjøntegaard securing the third place on the podium, 22.9 seconds after Russia, but securely ahead of the rest of the field.
“With Emil and Tarjei, two of our best athletes were not in the relay,” Johannes Thingnes Bø said during the press conference. “I was hoping that we could make the podium, and we did. A perfect race for everyone on the team. Erlend and Lars Helge were called up last minute, but they were relaxed, and third place is good. It’s not easy for Erlend to go out with Schempp and Shipulin.”
Behind Norway, Austria, with Sven Grossegger, Julian Eberhard, Simon Eder, and Dominik Landertinger, finished fourth (+1:01.7), with one penalty and 11 spare rounds.
“Better shooting,” Simon Eder told the IBU in a video interview when questioned what it would have taken to reach the podium. “We always have the extra [penalty] loop. It’s not easy, it happens so fast. But we hope to manage it at the World Champs without it.”
“The running shape is very good in the Austrian team,” Landertinger added. “And if the shooting is a little bit better we can make the podium.”
France, starting without World Cup leader Martin Fourcade with a lineup of his older brother Simon Fourcade, Quentin Fillion Maillet, Simon Desthieux, and Jean Guillaume Beatrix, placed fifth (+1:39.3), with no penalties and 11 spares.
U.S. Ties Season-Best 6th; Canada 11th
Lowell Bailey (US Biathlon leads Russia’s Maxim Tsvetkov during the first leg of the men’s 4 x 7.5 k IBU World Cup relay on Sunday in Antholz, Italy. Russia went on to win and the U.S. finished 1:43.7 minutes back in sixth, tying a season-best team result. (Photo: IBU)
On the last leg, Beatrix narrowly won out a race against American Sean Doherty, who crossed the finish less than five seconds later in sixth place, 1:43.7 behind the winners. The U.S. ended up with one penalty and 13 spares, and tied its season-best result after having achieved sixth in the relay a week ago in Ruhpolding, Germany.
The Americans started the race in bib 6 with their now-usual lineup of Lowell Bailey, Tim Burke, Leif Nordgren, and Doherty, the same starters they had used at the World Championships in Kontiolahti, Finland, where the U.S. placed 14th in the men’s relay.
Bailey briefly took the lead on the loop out of the arena, before two misses in his prone shooting stage required spare rounds and set him back to 15th, but still within 15.5 seconds out of the lead. With another spare in his standing stage, he still moved up five positions, and with the second-fastest, first-leg course time on his final loop, he tagged off in seventh, 20.8 seconds behind Germany’s Lesser.
Burke held that position throughout his first loop, but two misses in the prone stage set him back. In the standing shooting, he used all three spare rounds to avoid the penalty lap, falling back to 14th before he made up ground again with a fast last loop (third-best course time) to tag Nordgren in ninth (+1:04.3).
“Today proved that last week was not a fluke,” Burke said in a US Biathlon press release. “We are happy to be right in the mix with the ‘big’ biathlon nations but we still know that we are capable of more.”
“I got the tag from Tim right with the Czech Republic,” Nordgren wrote in an email to FasterSkier. “For all of the first loop I just focused on staying nice and relaxed, trying to conserve as much energy as possible. Prone I wanted to be pretty aggressive and it worked out well.”
After a clean prone shooting, Nordgren left the range in seventh place, virtually tied with a few other teams.
“The second loop I left the range with Eder from Austria, again I was just tucked in with him saving energy,” Nordgren recalled. “Although I had super great skis today, so eventually on the downhill I put in a good transition and was pushing towards the French team in front of us.”
After using two spare rounds in his standing stage, Nordgren still managed to move up to sixth place as some other teams, such as Italy and Switzerland, struggled on this leg, and handed off 1:04.5 minutes behind the leaders — about the same gap he had when he started.
Russia’s Evgeniy Garanichev (l) leads Tim Burke (US Biathlon) during the second leg of the men’s 4 x 7.5 k IBU World Cup relay in Antholz, Italy. (Photo: IBU/Rene Miko)
“Standing was the only disappointing part about my race today, it was a bummer to have two mistakes, but I didn’t lose any places and I was quick with the extras,” Nordgren wrote. “I was surprised on the third loop, I actually had some energy to push. Eventually France passed me and got a small gap I couldn’t close.”
Doherty kept the team in sixth on his first loop and through the first prone shooting, which he cleaned, reducing his gap to first by about ten seconds.
“The conditions today were ideal,” Doherty wrote in an email. “The course was in great shape and there was no wind. The altitude here adds to the difficulty, but I also pushed hard on the second loop and I did not really hold it together on the range as I wish I could have.”
By the final standing shooting he had moved to fifth, and was on the range behind Austria, with France nearby and Slovakia further behind. Austria’s Landertinger shot clean and finished first, while Doherty caused a penalty lap. But he only lost one position and still had France’s Beatrix in sight who had needed three spares.
Doherty skied a fast final loop, almost closing a 20-second gap again, finishing sixth, 4.4 seconds behind France in fifth and 1:43.7 behind Russia.
“I am a little bummed to have had that penalty because I was excited to fight for 5th. But overall 6th was secure,” Doherty wrote.
“I am happy with another strong result,” Doherty added in the US Biathlon press release. “We were in the mix the whole time and even though I did not shoot my best the team did well. We are all looking forward to the next relay.”
“As a team I think we’re happy with this race, but it was nowhere near a perfect race for us,” Nordgren wrote. “We still have more to give and will be looking for more in the relays to come.”
Canada in bib 7 chose a lineup of Christian Gow, Nathan Smith, Macx Davies, and Scott Gow. Brendan Green had to sit out the relay because of back issues following his collision in Saturday’s pursuit, “which did not improve until race time,” according to Biathlon Canada head coach Matthias Ahrens. “We had to put Scott Gow in his place,” Ahrens wrote in an email.
Younger brother Christian Gow jumped out to the lead after cleaning the initial prone stage, but on the next loop he lost some ground, crossing the next timing point in 11th, just 10 seconds out of first. After he required two spare rounds in his standing stage, Christian lost additional time to the leaders, but kept his position in the field, tagging off to Smith in 11th (+1:08.3).
Smith, currently the highest-ranked Canadian in the overall World Cup, cleaned both stages for his first 100-percent shooting in a race this season. Reflecting on his race in an email, he said his ski shape was off — and it has been for the last couple days. Unable to move up in the field, he tagged Davies in 11th (+1:07.7).
“I wanted to make up some spots and get our team up to the top 10. I knew it would mean some really good shooting,” Smith wrote in an email. “I’m really happy to finally have my first clean of the winter, especially after poor shooting in the other two races this weekend. On the other hand my skiing hasn’t been where it should for the last two weeks. I’m not sure why, I went from my best ski shape to my worst ski shape in literally 3 days. I have been struggling with back pain after a hard downhill crash in the Ruhpolding 20 km.”
Davies went on to clean his prone stage and move into 10th, reducing the gap to the leaders to 41 seconds. In standing, he needed all three spares, which caused him to lose some time. Overall Davies skied the second-best course time of his leg (only behind Norway’s Bø), and handed off to Scott Gow in 10th place (+1:39.0).
On the anchor leg, Scott needed two spares in his prone stage and one in standing, with Estonia’s anchor Ermits Kalev still passing him on the final loop. The Canadian crossed the finish in 11th, 5.7 seconds behind Estonia and 2:28.9 minutes behind Russia.
Combined, the team had no penalty and required just eight spares. But 11th wasn’t exactly close to their season best: the Canadians finished sixth in Hochfilzen, Austria and 10th last week in Ruhpolding.
“There were some good aspects of our relay: Christian’s first prone was amazing, my shooting, and Macx’s skiing,” Smith wrote. “Overall though I would say unfortunately it was not a good relay. A good race for us is top 6. The potential for a medal is there if everyone can put together their best race on the same day. Easier said than done.”
The Biathlon World Cup resumes in two weeks on Canada’s home turf in Canmore, Alberta, with sprints on Thursday, Feb. 4 and Friday, Feb. 5, followed by mass starts on Saturday, Feb. 6, and single-mixed (1 woman, 1 man) and mixed (2 women, 2 men) relays on Sunday, Feb. 7.
“I’m going to North America in a good mood,” Germany’s Peiffer said at the press conference. “The last three weeks were really exhausting. Now I had a good week here in Antholz, and I am looking forward to go to Canmore. I have never been there before. Maybe not as many [spectators] as in Ruhpolding or Antholz, but it’s nice to see a new place for biathlon.”
“I will be in Romania for my last Junior World Championships,” Sean Doherty, 20, wrote, which will take place in Cheile Gradistei (Brasov, Romania) from Jan. 27 to Feb. 2. “So I will only be attending the Presque Isle World Cup [after Canmore].”
Ole Einar Bjørndalen of Norway racing in the relay at the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia. Today in Sjusjøen, Norway, he picked up yet another win to add to his long list of conquests: the season-opening mass start.
Say what you will about Ole Einar Bjørndalen, but he just won’t quit.
The 40-year-old Norwegian biathlete proved that once again, he’s lasted one more season than everyone expected. He won the men’s mass start in Sjusjøen, Norway, over a field of the world’s top competitors, many of whom are more than 10 years younger than him.
Bjørndalen was in the news recently when he was awarded the “Best Male Athlete of the 2014 Olympics” by the Association of National Olympic Committees. But today – less than ten days after traveling back from the awards ceremony, which was held in Bangkok, Thailand – he was back to winning races.
It was teammate Lars Helge Birkeland who went into the final stage with the lead, and he shot a clean round to hit the trails still in first place.
“That’s what’s cool,” Birkeland told Norwegian broadcaster NRK after the race. “I love that kind of duel in standing shooting, so it really got me going.”
After that it was Bjørndalen dueling it out with fellow veteran and World Cup Champion Emil Hegle Svendsen. Both shot slowly and deliberately. Svendsen picked up one penalty, but Bjørndalen hit the trails and caught Birkeland by the finish, beating him by 6.7 seconds.
“Then I managed to get him at the end,” Bjørndalen said.
He noted that it felt good to win, especially as he has been teased about the new curved Exel poles he is using this season. The unusual design certainly didn’t slow him down today.
“It’s nice to win,” he told NRK, according to a translation. “I have received so much criticism for having changed poles, so it was nice to show that you can go fast with that kind poles too.”
Svendsen ended up third +19.7; each of the podium finishers had a single penalty on the day.
Martin Fourcade, who won two gold medals at the Olympics as well as the overall World Cup title last season, went into the final shooting with Bjørndalen and Svendsen. But the French biathlete, who appears to have recovered from a bout of mononucleosis just fine, missed three shots in the last standing stage.
With clean final stages, Norway’s Erlend Bjøntegaard and Johannes Thingnes Bø finished fourth and fifth, with two and three penalties respectively. Alexis Boeuf of France rounded out the top six with a single missed shot.
Fellow Norwegian Alexander Os, who had a dominant and surprising win in the sprint, finished a disappointing 16th place, with three penalties and 2:39 behind the winner.
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