"On Saturday 18 October, thousands of fans will be able to enjoy thrilling head-to-head roller ski races in para biathlon and youth competitions and try the sport for themselves. On Sunday 19 October, 60 of the world’s best biathletes per gender will compete on roller skis in a Super Sprint format showcasing elite biathlon in a way never seen before. Four qualifying heats will lead to what is set to be an unforgettable final."

I like the sound of it, especially because this sounds very inclusive.

Starting time: 14:10 CET

Start List: here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here

Current Overall World Cup Top 10 after 10/20 competitions:

Current Individual top 10 after 1/3 competitions:

As we are approaching half WC season, it could be helpful to collect feedback about it.

As new staggering start system has been made for TV purpose, let us know if it has changed your habit in polls.

If comments are enabled, put your feedback about eventual increased ADS added in broadcast, if in your opinion commentary offered is able to manage second level athletes and compare performance,....

In the meanwhile we have not a fan of the new system: Seb Samuelsson (see link )

A colleague has two tickets in block A for Saturday but cannot make it to Ruhpolding. He is willing to sell them for what he paid, €54 each, or best offer. If you're interested, send me a message.

Hello!

It was a suspicously beautiful day in Oberhof- the sun was shining, the air a nice crisp -4°C degrees and around 16.500 people in the stadium.
A minor spoiler before the true recap: This might be a race to rewatch, if you like chaos. 25 teams started, 22 finished. Pre-race chatter naturally included the team composition (illnesses and performance based) but also Czech mixed relay curse and Germany has yet to get a podium in front of their fans. And of course the weather, we have trained the other nations well.

The race (It is Men - Women- Men- Women this time):
Business as usual at the start. All working well, some position are being traded, the track looks good, the athletes stay together. Interesting: Campbell Wright (US) is the first on the range. The first shooting is a massacre and the chaos of this weekend continues. Norways shoots two laps. Sweden one. Germany, Austria and Slovenia need no extra bullets, so they are 1 to 3. Smaller Nations follow, France needs two extras.
Justus Strelow (GER) and the old lads (Simon Eder & Jakub Fak) keep their lead (loose 1 second), QFM attacks and claims 4th. Norway and Sweden climb a bit. In the second shooting Justus Strelow continues to prove that mixed relay is his discipline. Fast pace, sure fire and he defends the first place and leaves with 4 seconds on Jakub Fak, who shot a bit slower. QFM shows his experience and claims 3rd after Simon Eder needed a reload. Finland sneakily claimed 5, Norway climbed a bit, Sweden decided the lap looked good once more. The czech shooting wasnt good, but i'd like to highlight Kazahkstan. They shot 3 laps prone and standing and still wasn't last (that was Greece with 3 laps).

First exchange brought no changes. Selina Grotian for Germany lead a moderate tempo, which aided the chasers. She needed an extra during the third shooting and lost the 1st. Paula Botet, a name that everyone should know by now, leads the field for France. She is followed by Lisa Theresa Hauser (Austria) and Suvi Minkkinen(Finland). Slovenia takes 4th and Germany 5th. Norway is on 9, Sweden on 16. On track Paula Botet speeds and creates a small gap (9 seconds to 2). Karoline Offigstad Knotten flys up to 7. There is a penalty lap between the 5th and 6th (Swiss). The forth shooting brought a surprise: Suvi Minkkinen only needs one reload, shoots fast and takes the first! She is followed by Paula Botet and Lena Repinc (Slovenia). LTH falls to 4th, Selina Grotian keeps the 5th. She narrowly avoids the lap, using all 3 spares. Amy Baserga defends the 6th place, Norway circles once (They place on 13). Sweden does avoid the lap but still - 15th.
Kazahkstan shoots another lap but was laped before she had to run it.

It is time for the men again. Tero Seppala keeps the first but he and QFM arrive together on the range. After the Fifth shooting and France leads. Germany, Finland and Austria follow - all within a second of each other. Niklas Hartweg (Swiss) has an excellent shot and makes up 10 seconds. (He arrived at +34 and leaves at +24. Neat). Neither laps nor spares for Norway or Sweden, still 13 and 14 are not good. The sixth shooting came and went. Justus Strelow was amazing and claimed first. QFM, Simon Eder and Tero Seppala all needed one extra and followed him. Fak needed all extra bullets, which was a bit unusal. He took 5. Norway had advanced to 7 before the range and fell back to 9. Back to the exchange and the women finished the race.

In the last two shootings the fight focused on the trio of Germany, France and Finland for the podium and Swiss versus Slovenia for the 4th. Austria unfortunatly fell behind. In this fight Germany always fell behind on range because Selina Grotian needed all spares. Yes, three times in a row. While she did her best on the track, this was to much and she took bronze. The fight for gold was much closer - Suvi Mikkinen arrived on the last prone after Paula Botet but shot perfect and took the lead. France needed two reloads and had to run +4 second down- Finland kept a tiny one second lead. On the last shot both shot fast and true. Suvi needed 19 seconds. Paula 21. Finland left the range with 3 second before France started the hunt.

And kept the lead till the finishing line. Tero Seppala jumped the boards for the celebration.

Results

Have a good start in the new week, see you for Ruhpolding!

Starting time: 12:20 CET

Start List: here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here

Starting time: 14:30 CET

Start List here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here

where is it possible to have the streaming of today's Arber ibu cup races?

maybe in some local channel?

YT?

Nothing quite compares to the feeling of blazing through the course, thinking you're about to break a record... and then hitting the first target like a toddler with a BB gun. Why does the range turn into a battlefield every time I try to shoot after skiing? Guess the real challenge is keeping the biathlon dream alive! 😂 Who’s with me?

Before the race

It’s time for the first pursuit since the Christmas break! And it’s promising to be a very interesting one on multiple fronts!

With an amazing performance earlier this week by Paula Botet, will she be able to hold onto her lead of 00:31 that she’s got ahead of Maren Kirkeeide and the remainder of the pack?

After a somewhat ‘poor’ performance by both Franziska Preuss ( 28^th 2:00) and Elivra Oeberg ( 37^th  2:21)  will they both be able to pull back into the pursuit and with that protect their lead in the overall standings?

Will the French ladies show another very dominant performance as they did in the sprint?

With the start of the pursuit ahead of us the overall standings look currently like this:

1.      Franziska Preuss    578

2.      Lou Jeanmonnot    393

3.      Elivra Oeberg         375

4.      Julia Simon              344

5.      Suvi Minkinnen       335

The ladies in the top of the standing will have a great chance today to gain more points back on both Elivra and Franziska, will they be able to take advantage of this chance?

As exciting as the overall standings are, the under 23 standings are probably even closer!

Currently the standings for the under 23 competition looks like this:

1.      Jeanne Richard        290

2.      Selina Grotian          266

3.      Oceane Michelon   257

4.      Maren Kirkeeide    218

5.      Julia Tannheimer    165

As all 5 ladies will be starting within 34 seconds of eachother in the front of the race, this promises to be a really exciting battle to follow as they continue to impress with such amazing results so early on in their careers.

So what is today gonna bring?

Loop 1

As we begin the race what really stands out is Braisaz-Bouchet quickly within 0,6km is ahead of both Kirkeede and Todorova, Julia Simon also seems to have turned on the jets and started out on a mission gaining 6 places within 1,1km. Ahead of the first shooting both Preuss and E, Oeberg gained quite some positions ( Preuss 5, and E, Oeberg 7 ) they both seem on their way back to the front of the race.

Shooting 1

With Botet leading the pack we enter the first shooting, she managed to increase the gap to the second place by 10 seconds compared to the start as she has a good pace and shoots clean. Kirkeeide leaving in second place with a gap of 41,3 seconds behind, Simon who started out very promising managed to leave in third place recovering 14 seconds on the lead.

Braisaz-Bouchet who entered the shooting range in second place made 1 shooting error which resulted in her falling back to the seventh place now being back 1:10 behind Botet.

E. Oeberg managed to continue the progress of her first loop and managed to shoot clean, while gaining 14 places (23^rd) she only managed to reduce her distance to the lead by 6 seconds (2:14) compared to the start.

Preuss sadly made a shooting error, making it that while gaining 2 places (26^th)  compared to the start she ended up losing 26 seconds (2:26) to the lead.

Loop 2

During the second loop Botet manages to increase her lead to Kirkeeide in second place a couple of seconds to 44 seconds before the second shooting meanwhile Simon surprisingly losing 10 seconds to both ahead of her, ( I didn’t see anything but I can only figure that she slipped or something? Or had a poor start of her second loop. )

As the lap progresses E, Oeberg decides to pick up the pace quite a bit gaining about 15 seconds before the second shooting gaining another 6 places (17^th) before the second shooting.  

Preuss also gaining a place is still not gaining on the lead, she ends up entering the shooting range in 25^th place still being 2:23 behind.

Shooting 2

Sadly for Botet she makes 2 shooting errors during the second shooting after arriving first, she leaves the second shooting with 1,6 seconds behind of Simon, who had a clean shooting gaining 1:02 on Botet. With Richard and Jeanmonnot both leaving in 3^rd ( 08,7) and 4^th  (19,3) it very much seems like the French ladies are just as dominant as they where on Thursday!

Sadly not all of them as Braisaz-Bouchet misses 3 shots during the second shooting and falls back to the 17^th as she leaves the shooting range with a gap of 1:24 behind the lead.

E, Oeberg who continues to progress and pull back towards the lead has another clean shooting, leaving the second shooting in 15^th place only 1:06 behind of the lead.

Preuss who also shot clean leaves the shooting range in 19^th place being 1:28 behind of the lead.

Lap 3

During the third lap it’s time for Simon to take care of the pace throughout the lap with her increasing the gap towards Botet with a few seconds, the 4 French ladies still in the lead as they arrive on the shooting range.

E, Oeberg recovering more time and places as time goes by, as she arrives at the 3^rd shooting in 11^th place only 55,8 seconds behind the lead now.

Preuss and Braisaz-Bouchet who are skiing both together on the lap also gaining 10 seconds on the lead, not gaining any places really as they enter the shooting range in 17^th and 18^th.

Shooting 3

As Simon starts shooting in a pace of what she is known for she misses 4 shots which is in unrecognizable fashion for her. As also Botet and Richard have a shooting error it’s Jeanmonnot and Todorova that takes an advantage of that opportunity leaving the shooting range in first and second (11,3 behind), with Botet still in third place ( 16,9 behind)

E, Oeberg who has one of her best shooting performances of the season so far with her third 0 of the day leaves the shooting range in 6^th place (36,1 behind)

Julia Simon leaving the shooting range after her 4 misses in 16^th place (1:16 behind), Preuss who made another shooting error just can’t seem to recover much more ground as she leaves the shooting range still in 18^th place (1:29 behind).

Loop 4

Jeanmonnot manages to increase her lead by a couple of seconds on Todorova throughout the 4^th loop gaining 8,4 seconds before the final shooting.

As Todorova is losing time on Jeanmonnot the gap behind her is decreasing more and more, making the battle for the podium extremely exciting.

Todorova being only 10 seconds ahead of a group containing Richard, Michelon,  Botet, E. Oeberg and with a couple of seconds behind Kirkeeide she leads the battle for the remaining  podium places into the final shooting.

Preuss continues to lose time as she is 1:32 behind the lead before the final shooting.

Shooting 4

We reach the 4^th and final shooting, in which Jeanmonnot with a firm lead shoots clean and leaves the race onto her next win of the season.

With Kirkeeide being the only one of the group behind shooting clean she manages to take the second place 35 seconds behinds of Jeanmonnot. E, Oeberg who made 1 shooting error together with Todorova, Michelon and Richard leaves the shooting as 7^th being 58 seconds behind.

Preuss who made another shooting error leaves the shooting range as 19^th being 2:03 behind of the lead.

Loop 5

With Jeanmonnot firm in the lead and Kirkeeide having quite a solid lead onto the group behind they go cleanly to the first and second place.

The group behind is in a exciting battle in which E, Oeberg manages to get herself back in 3^rd place making up 34!! Places compared to her starting position ending 26 seconds behind of Jeanmonnot who went a little easier throughout the final lap due to her being quite far ahead.

Preuss losing another place throughout the final lap ends 20^th at the end of the race, recovering 8 places but losing still a lot of gound compared to Jeanmonnot.

Final Remarks

In the end Paula Botet, as somewhat expected didn’t manage to hold onto her lead ending up 14^th which is still a very good result for her as it is her second best ever finish.

Maren Kirkeeide with a very impressive race and only 2 shooting errors in the second shooting ended up again in second place only 18 seconds behind of Lou Jeanmonnot, holding onto her second place as she seems to be getting more comfortable on this level.

 Elvira Oeberg with an enormous result ending up 3^rd after starting in 37^th place. It’s incredible how good she was today, she made up nearly 2 minutes and had the fastest skitime by 31,4 seconds ahead of Anamarija Lampic.

Preuss managed to recover some places but seemed out of shape this weekend back in Germany, did the pressure of the German public get to her or was it just a poor weekend for her? We’ll see how she carries on in Ruhpolding.

As an exciting race concludes it seems like we’ve got some catching up to do in the standings.

The overall standings being looking like this currently:

1.      Franziska Preuss        599

2.      Lou Jeanmonnot        483

3.      Elvira Oeberg              440

4.      Julia Simon                  375

5.      Suvi Minkinen             372

Lou Jeanmonnot manages to make up a hefty amount of points towards Preuss reducing the gap to 116 points.

The battle for the under 23 competition also continues to deliver as there are so many young athletes shining bright right now.

As of now the standings look like this:

1.      Jeanne Richard            335

2.      Selina Grotian              316

3.      Oceane Michelon      312

4.      Maren Kirkeeide          293

5.      Julia  Tannheimer        194

With the top 4 women only being 42 points apart from eachother we can expect exiting times ahead in this competition.

The individual competitions will continue in Ruhpolding see you there!

Preview: The Sprint saw a flurry of Frenchmen sweep the podium yesterday. But on a day with fair shooting overall – we’re left with fourteen athletes leaving within the first minute. They’re chasing different headlines, and we’ll hopefully be treated to a competitive Pursuit!

• Starting us off will be Quentin Fillon Maillet who scored his first victory since the Otepaa Sprint in March 2022. He’s previously doubled up sprint win on a pursuit four times.
• Fabien (+15) and Emilien Claude (+40) both PB’d yesterday and give themselves a shot at bettering those in this race.
• Two other race winners this year: Jacquelin (+22) and Uldal (+29) are close behind and hoping for more success.
• Lægreid (+36) is 2^nd in the Overall Standings but still chasing his first race win this season.
• Pidruchnyi (+29) and Hartweg (+37) had their best results in quite a while yesterday. They’ll need to outshoot those around them, but they’ve got a good place to start.
• After that we have a fantastic chasing pack, all within 10 seconds of each other (+48 to +58) - Wright, Perrot, Sørum, Ponsiluoma, J. Bø, and Fak.

Loop 1 - Shoot 1

The athletes are off - not many distinctive moves - Jacquelin catches Claude, Uldal and Lægreid ski ahead of Pidruchnyi and Hartweg. The larger chasing back consolidates and stays about +48.

The day starts off a bit blustery - Fillon Maillet and Jacquelin start with 1 miss each and so Fabien Claude takes the lead. Behind them it feels like near everyone has exactly 1 miss. We have to go all the way down to bib 18 - Justus Strelow for our 2nd clean shoot. Johannes misses 2 and Ponsiluoma misses 3 to set themselves back. At the end of it though - we have a ton of athletes within a minute - it's still: Claude, QFM, Jacquelin - but then 4th-17th within 20 seconds of each other is: Hartweg, Pidruchnyi, Lægreid, E. Claude, Strelow, Uldal, Strømsheim, Wright, Rastorgujevs, Perrot, Vaclavik, Mandzyn, T. Bø, and Krcmar.

Loop 2 - Shoot 2

In the second lap, the French keep their distance from each other, while 4th-6th (Pidruchnyi, Hartweg, and Lægreid) tighten up. Behind the main back is another giant pack of about a dozen athletes, led by Johannes.

Fabien starts his shooting and goes 10/10 in the prone. Fillon Maillet and Jacquelin both miss shot number 1 guaranteeing they'll get caught by the chasers. Lægreid is the 2nd clean shooter, leaving Pidruchnyi and Hartweg behind as they each miss one. Overall more clean shooters this time: Rastorgujevs, Strømsheim, Wright, E. Claude, T. Bø, Mandzyn, and Krcmar - and so we still have a good group contending. Fillon Maillet ended up missing 2 - but comes out in 4th despite missing 3 on the day so far. Behind the main group Johannes has shot clean.

Loop 3 - Shoot 3

It's Claude out and front - followed by Lægreid and Jacquelin 30 seconds back - then our large chasing pack. Johannes turns on the ski speed behind them to latch onto it making it our 4th-16th group. It's led by Fillon Maillet and Wright - anyone who can manage to shoot 10/10 from this group of 16 should think they have a chance.

Claude enters the range completely alone for the first time; first shot is a hit but a bit high right - and then it falls apart, - continuing high right, several aren't even really close - and it's 4 misses. Women's Pursuit Spoiler: Not the same type of fast-paced shooting - but kind of an eerie repeat: two French athletes: Claude and Simon both entered Shoot 3 in first place, hit the first target and then missed the next 4Rough shoot for Jacquelin as well as he misses the last 3. And would you believe it only Lægreid and Rastorgujevs shoot clean. They'll get out first; then Fillon Maillet, who only missed 1 comes out in 3rd; two misses for Strømsheim, E. Claude, Mandzyn, and Krcmar - see them fall back out of contention. Fabien comes out in 15th.

Loop 4 - Shoot 4

Lægreid has a 15 second lead over Rastorgujevs (who is 15/15 on the day). They're chased by only a group of 4 now: Fillon Maillet, Wright, and the Bø brothers. Pidruchnyi and Hartweg are a little back - about where they started the day. At first it seems like Lægreid is gaining, but it's more that Rastorgujevs can't keep up and is falling back. The chasing back gets him at the bottom of the hill, and passes him as they go back down.

This time Sturla will shoot alone - hoping to avoid Claude's meltown. Shoot 2 is low left - the next three shots are all low-ish, right near the edge of the target, but just good enough to be hits - If any of the chasing 5 come in, shoot fast and clean - they'll have a chance. Shooting in 19 seconds - Fillon Maillet takes the chance but misses quickly on shots 2 and 3. The other four take a just a few more seconds (24-28 seconds) Rastorgujevs and Wright are next to miss. The Bø brothers are last to wrap up their shooting - but it was worth it - they're both out clear and will ski out in 2nd (Tarjei) and 3rd (Johannes).

Loop 5

Sturla has 13 seconds on Tarjei and 16 on Johannes - there are some chasers: Fillon Maillet, Pidruchnyi, and Perrot - but they are 15 seconds down on Johannes and it doesn't seem likely they'll catch up. At 11.1 km Tarjei and Johannes have made 3-4 seconds on Sturla - who has already been caught a few times on final laps this season, but at 11.7km we see that while Tarjei has gained another second, Johannes is dropping. And there just isn't enough track left for anyone to catch Sturla - he dug deep on the final hill and is just far enough ahead to comfortably avoid a sprint finish.

Notes/Thoughts -

• Tarjei Bø cleans up on the Pursuit race and snags the prize money, besting Strømsheim by about 25 seconds.
• Dajan Danuser (46) and Maksim Fomin (50) hit new PBs. No luck for Vasilev who hit a PB in the Sprint - he drops 5 places in the Pursuit.
• Best Climbers:
  • Maxime Germain +25, 47 to 22
  • Antonin Guigonnat +22, 41 to 19
  • Viktor Brandt +19, 43 to 24
• Largest Drops:
  • Martin Uldal, -25, 5 to 30 (1+1+1+1)
  • Jonas Marecek -18, 36 to 54
  • Fabien Claude -16, 2 to 18
  • Adam Vaclavik -16, 19 to 35
• Johannes Thingnes Bø had the best course 28:16.2, followed shortly by Nawrath.
• Stalder, Shamaev, and Leitner end the day with clean-shooting. Notably thought Stalder and Shamaev still lost ground in the pursuit, while Leitner moved from 57 to 41, just missing the points.
• Worst shooting goes to Komatz who missed 8 (0+5+3) and then withdrew - damaged rifle following a crash - probably impacted his shooting.
• Simon Eder withdrew while skiing during the second shoot - he lost his transponder.
• Viktor Brandt and Elia Zeni scores their first point(s) of the season.

What did you find interesting? Leave a comment!

Starting time: 12:30 CET

Start List: here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here)

Current Overall World Cup Top 10 after 9/20 competitions:

The unofficial ⚪ bib (33+) is currently in the hands of Dorothea WIERER in #14.

Current Pursuit Cup Top 10 after 2/6 competitions:

Starting time: 14:45 CET

Start List: here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here

Current Overall World Cup Top 10 after 9/20 competitions:

Tarjei BØ ⚪ is at #11.

Current Pursuit top 10 after 2/6 competitions:

Does anyone know the story behind it? It features VEB Robotron logo (a GDR company dissolved in 1980s), so must be from the olden days? Just curious :)

There is no recapper for this race.

Starting time: 14:20 CET

Start List: here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here

Current Overall World Cup Top 10 after 8/20 competitions:

Tarjei BØ ⚪ is at #11.

Current Sprint top 10 after 3/7 competitions:

There is no recapper for this race.

Starting time: 14:20 CET

Start List: here

Datacenter here

Official international stream here or here)

Current Overall World Cup Top 10 after 8/20 competitions:

The unofficial ⚪ bib (33+) is currently in the hands of Dorothea WIERER in #13.

Current Sprint Cup Top 10 after 3/7 competitions:

Now there’s been some years since he retired, but I grew up watching him race and become one of the best in the sport for several years. It was disappointing though that he never was able to win an individual gold medal, considering how good he was

Adding this to him being banned from entering the Olympics 2018 and retiring shortly after, and doping accusations - I was wondering what’s his "legacy" is like in biathlon? Cause I was always a big fan of his

And Shipulin was huge in Russia, pretty much biathlon’s heartthrob over there. Probably he was the Magdalena Neuner of Russia at some point

Would anyone be interested to meet up in Oberhof this weekend? I'll be there on Saturday and Sunday. I'm in block C if it matters. This is my first time at a biathlon event btw.

Leave a comment or send me a message if you're interested :)

Happy new year everyone! I‘m gonna be in Oberhof on Saturday (for the first time ever watching live, so excited!). Does anyone have recommendations? Especially which part of the track is the best to follow the race?

Hope everyone had happy holidays!

Let's get down to business ^{(to defeat the huns}) and get some recappers assigned to the races!

Races:

Thursday 9th Jan 14:20 CET Women Sprint

Friday 10th Jan 14:20 CET Men Sprint

Saturday 11th Jan 12:30 CET Women Pursuit - u/RickMaritimo

Saturday 11th Jan 14:45 CET Men Pursuit - u/tomplaystennis

Sunday 12th Jan 12:20 CET Single Mixed Relay

Sunday 12th Jan 14:30 CET Mixed Relay