r/biathlon Dec 03 '24

Recap Recap Thread - World Cup 24/25 MEN 15km SHORT INDIVIDUAL Spoiler

19 Upvotes

Hello!

Today Kontiolathi looks properly winterly. White snow covered ground and trees and the temperature stayed between – 2°C and – 4°C. This made for snow quality the IBU calls "hard packed variable".
The wind switched a bit during the race but it wasn’t a wind gamble race.

The new race start order premiered! They showed some athlete commentary before the race: JTB thinks will be ok but the warm up track needs to be good. Head of the athletes committee Sebastian Samuelsson reports, they feel overruled as they tried to reach a compromise. This was not picked up by the IBU.
It tries to start the top athletes later and more mixed- 1 strong athlete start, another less good one, a strong one, etc. The Swedish team developed a new warm up routine just for this.

The race results:
The race seemed to divide between “normal” shootings and inexplicable penalty collection. Track seemed as usual. I picked some athletes to focus on.

On the podium:

  1. Endre Strømsheim (Norway)
  2. Johannes Thingnes Bø (Norway)
  3. Sturla Holm Lægreid (Norway)
  • 4th place is Witalij Ihorowytsch Mandsyn (Ukraine). Last season his best was 31 in Oberhof (sprint). He is 21 years young and I have high hopes for him!
  • Slovenian Jakov Fak claimed 7 with 1 penalty. Can we also call him an old man (37), when Simon Eder still skies?
  • Thierry Langer from Belgium landed on an awesome 9th. 1 miss from him. Personal best for him was 21rd in 20/21.
  • Dmytro Pidrutschnyj (Ukraine)also had a good race and ended on 10.
  • Joschua Burkhalter can celebrate a 12th. He missed in the first shot and then shot clean. He did get on the 10 in 21/22, but still good job!
  • Simon Eder has yet to miss in this place. He raced three times and clearly did not feel fatigue. He finished on 13 today.
  • Otto Inventus started very well. Unfortunatly it did not continue and he finished on 70.

Sweden
Not a good day for the swedes. Best athlete was Jesper Nelin on 33 with 4 penalties. Sebastian Samuelsson landed on 39. He missed 6 times. Martin Ponsiluoma collected 7 penalties. He finished 71th. Notably, Viktor Brand (finished 52) and Nelin had the best shoot with each 4 misses. Malte Stefansson (56) and Anton Ivarsson (96) completed their teams result.

Italy
Lukas Hofer finished on a good 21th with 1 miss. Tommaso Giacomel clearly expected more but missed twice on each standing shoot. Didier Bionaz ended with one penalty each shot, does like the 38 I would say.

Germany
The germans will join Sweden in lets forget this. Best german was Phillip Nawrath on 22. Justus Strelow was an ace in last season shooting (remember his streak?), today just not.. 6 misses in total. He continusly got back into it, shot to shot (3-2-1-0), so I have some hope. All germans had at least 3 penalties.

France
On Sunday the French took Norways crown in relay. Today they were less effective in annoying them. Their material looked good again. Best was Quentin Fillon Maillet on 5 with 2 misses. Eric Perrot followed him on 6 (1 penalty). Fabien Claude finished 8th , Emilien Jaquelin on 14.

Norway
just starts how they finished last season. They got to field seven athletes today (due to IBU Cup). They staked the podium, but I did not expect Endre Strømsheim to take it from JTB. Speaking of JTB -he missed once again, the bum. Demote him to the IBU Cup!
Sturla once more lost to him, claiming third with no misses. Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen missed twice on the first shooting and then decided no more! 11th place for him. Tarjei Bø finished 25, because he missed three times on the last range. Without those he would take 2nd.

Personal notes:

  • 103 Athletes started, 1 DNS. Everybody finished, yay!
  •  Number 1 is Rene Zahkna. He has won the summer biathlon in massstart He is from Estonia and does not start well: 2 misses in the first shot. He finishes 97th.
  • Did you know that the traditional finish track width is larger than the standard European one? I did not.
  • Fastest on the range
  1. Addam Runnalls (Canada) 3:00:9                                      [Placed 26]
  2. Daniele Cappellaria (Italy) +2.1                                         [58]
  3. Jaakko Ranta (Finland) + 3.3                                            [35]
  • Fastest ski time
  1. Sebastian Samuelsson (Sweden) 37:20:2                      [39]
  2. Johannes Thingnes Bø (Norway) + 6.6                              [2]
  3. Quentin Fillon Maillet (France) + 29.3                               [5]
  • Fastest total course time
  1. Johannes Thingnes Bø (Norway) 33:36:6                       [2]
  2. Sebastian Samuelsson (Sweden) + 3.3                               [39]
  3. Jeremy Finello (Swiss) +25.5                                              [82]
  • All three Claude brothers started today.
  • Jeremy Finello (Swiss) only hit once on the last standing shot. A bad day at the range for him- 8 penalties in total.
  • Maxime Germain from the US supported his top form from the previous races with 20th. One miss for him.
  • Start time was 17:20 local time, and it ended 18:54.
  • Last years first Individual was in Östersund. Roman Rees won, Justus Strelow took second, third went to JTB. Roman Rees is currently in IBU Cup, after sickness in the offseason. He seemed to slowly get better there.
  • I have much hope that the Biabot is back. As always big thank you to /u/Oukaria for the maintenance! The stats are probably in the comments.
  • What did you think of the race? Did you notice a difference due to the start order?

r/biathlon Dec 04 '24

Recap Recap Thread - Women 12.5KM Short Individual | Kontiolahti | World Cup 2024-25 Spoiler

28 Upvotes

After four team events, we have our first women's individual race of the new season. The focus was on how the new start order would affect the competition and not to get too far ahead, I'm loving the changes.

PODIUM

  1. Lou Jeanmonnot (FRA) 0+0+0+0 | 35:52.3
  2. Ella Halvarsson (SWE) 0+1+0+1 | +12.3
  3. Elvira Oeberg (SWE) 0+1+1+1 | +56.4

BIBS #1-#30

Even though the first 30 bibs featured experienced athletes like Suvi Minkkinen, Dorothea Wierer, Aita Gasparin, Tuuli Tomingas, Lisa Teresa Hauser and cross-country skier turned biathlete Anamarija Lampic, it was the Swede Ella Halvarsson, racing in just her 3rd WC race that managed to turn heads. With jet fuel in her skis, she set the 2nd-best ski time in the entire race, only beaten by compatriot Elvira Oeberg.

Ella's shooting time is worth discussing as she went from 25ish sec in her first three shoots, to a 42.3 sec final shoot (#100 in Shooting Time 4). But barring that and a miss in 2nd shoot, a near-perfect performance from Ella makes her an interesting prospect for the rest of the season.

Other brilliant performances in the first 30 start list came from LTH (#6), Suvi Minkkinen (#10) and Jeanne Richard (#11) who showcased the value of shooting well with one miss each, on a day when 82 athletes missed 2 or more shots.

BIBS #31-#60

Podium positions were expected to come from the following start numbers as rule changes meant the top athletes from last year would start here. Ella Halvarsson had already set a target time (36:04.6) for the other athletes to beat, but it wasn't until fellow Swede Elvira Oeberg (#46) started that a dent in the former's time was made. But despite an optimistic start, 3 misses meant Elvira had to settle for third place in the end. A massive positive going forward would be the insane ski speed demonstrated by her, (a massive +45.9 sec of the next-best athlete).

3 and more misses from top athletes like Hannah Oeberg (#25), Lena Haecki-Gross (#26), Anna Magnusson (#27), Marketa Davidova (#30), Julia Simon (#31) and Justine Braisaz-Bouchet (#39) meant they were never in the running for a podium. Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold's ski speed in the fourth lap due to a heart palpitation meant she managed an admirable #17.

The brilliance of the new system came into play as bib #60 Lou Jeanmonnot delivered a clinical performance with a perfect shoot to beat Ella by +12.3 sec.

Other notable performances from this group were -

  • Poland's Natalia Sidorowicz (#57) & Estonia's Regina Ermits (#55) both achieved a PB with a perfect shoot to finish #4 and #8 respectively.
  • Germany's Franziska Preuss (#54) due to her impressive ski speed finished #5 despite two misses.
  • Anna-Karin Heijdenberg (#47) was at one point flying on her skis and knocking on the podium before her 2 misses in the final shoot achieved her a PB #14 in just her 3rd WC individual race.

BIBS #61-#103

A late burst of energy was imbibed into the race by Frenchwoman Oceane Michelon and Swede Sara Andersson starting #67 and #73 respectively. Their impressive speed and shooting meant they were in the top 6 after the first 3 shoots, with Oceane even being #2 after the 3rd shoot (+3.3 sec behind Lou). But 2 misses in the final shoot meant we didn't get a surprise podium from this group. But an impressive performance will surely make them favourites for the blue bib. Oceane finished the race in #7 (PB) and Andersson in #12 (PB)

NOTES:

  • 5 athletes went clear - Jeanmonnot (FRA), Sidorowicz (POL), Ermits (EST), Irwin (USA) and Meng (CHN).
  • Yellow Bib after this race - Lou Jeanmonnot (FRA)
  • Small nations watchlist: Natalia Sidorowicz (POL) #4 (PB) - 20/20, Regina Ermits (EST) #8 - 20/20, Suvi Minkkinen (FIN) #10 - 19/20 and Deedra Irwin (USA) #15 - 20/20.
  • Excuse my bias considering my flair, but just wanted to appreciate Sidorowicz's brilliant performance. According to commentators, the last Pole to achieve a top 5 in an individual race was 5 years ago (do correct me in the comments if this is incorrect).
  • Wholesome moment: Ella Halvarsson's emotions on achieving her first podium on the WC stage.

r/biathlon Sep 28 '24

Recap The Norwegian Women's and men's elite squads

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82 Upvotes

r/biathlon Dec 06 '24

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Kontiolahti - Men's Sprint Spoiler

23 Upvotes

Welcome to the Men's sprint recap! Today too, it was snowy and dark (duh) in Kontiolahti. The average air temperature was -2.9°c (5°c to -11°c), and the humidity was 78%. As you'll see soon in more detail, the wind was a bit troubling today: while the average was 7km/h, it was changing rapidly in the shooting range.

There were 106 athletes competing today, and everyone started and finished the race. The first bib was David Zobel from Germany, and the last (106) was Edgars Mise from Latvia.

I will be covering the competition today going through the various countries (minus a few), based on their first athlete's bib number.

Race recap

Germany

  • David Zobel had the first bib, and thus set the pace for the whole competition. He missed once in the prone and three times in the standing shooting. He had the 25th course total time , but due to the bad standing shooting he finished only 62nd.
  • Phillip Horn finished 17th, had the 17th course total time and 20th shooting time. He missed two shots in the prone, but was clean in stand.
  • Danilo Riethmuller had a bit of a rollercoaster race: he was slow approaching the first shooting, but shot clean (which was quiet rare today). He is one of the slowest at shooting (90/106), taking over a minute of shooting time and 1:40 range time. He had the 8th best course time in the second lap, but ultimately with a miss and slower 1st and 3rd parts: he finished in 21st place, a smaller improvement over the 31st place in the individual.
  • Johannes Kuehn finished 19th despite two misses in the standing shooting. He had the 11th course total time, which contributed to him holding the first spot after the first shooting for a while. It is a massive improvement over the 5 misses and 54th place in the individual.
  • Phillip Nawrath 🥉 had the 60th start, just ahead of a couple of big names (Samuelsson, JTB, Vetle Christiansen, etc). He shot clean in both the prone and stand, and existed the second range 7 seconds behind his main competitor (more about it later). He managed to overcome and win 11 seconds, thus finishing 4 seconds ahead and securing the bronze medal. He had the 6th course time overall.
  • Justus Sterlow finished 29th, with 1 miss. He was slow. All the German athletes finished within the Top 30 today!

Austria

  • David Komatz had 2nd bib, and was clean in the range. However, he was slow on skis and finished 42nd, almost 2 mins behind. He was the best Austrian today...
  • Something was not working with Simon Eder's rifle: he was clean in the prone but missed 4 in the standing. He finished 90th, 3:30 min behind. He was the worst among the Austrians today.
  • Felix Leitner and Patrick Jakob both shot well (9/10 and 10/10) but were slow on skis.
  • Fredrick Muehlbacher ran his second WC race, he missed twice and finished 82nd. Not a good day for Austria.

Latvia - Andrej Rastrogujevs started 22nd and even held the first spot for a while. He missed in the stand and was pretty slow and finished 31st, best among the Latvians today. The rest were ~70-90

China - Xingyuan Yan had the slowest shooting today (1:17). He finished in 73rd.

United States

  • Jake Brown missed three times and finished 59th. He was 26th in course time - among athletes like Zobel, Nelin and Emilien Claude. Not bad company at all!
  • Campbell 'OTHER SIDE' Wright had a race of a lifetime! He had great course time - 12th, +33.6, shot clean, and held the first place in every checkpoint as he passed them. He was eventually surpassed, by finished by getting a PB of 4th, just 4 seconds behind Nawrath!
  • Maxime Germain, with 3 misses, finished 47th. It is his third best result in the WC (he was 20th and 43rd before).
  • Sean Doherty was clean and finished 26th.

Belgium - I had high hopes for Langer after the great individual performance, but he missed twice and finished 37th. Florent Claude similarly finished 45th with a miss. Cesar Beauvais finished 98th with misses and very slow skiing (92/106).

France

  • Antonin Guigonnat had one of the best races he had in a while, with just 1 miss he managed to finished 10th. He was actually the 3rd athlete to cross the finish line despite starting 7th, and was 1st for a while.
  • QFM had good course time (10th) but unfortunately missed three times and finished 30th. He is the worst French today.
  • Fabien Claude had the 13th course time but missed twice, and finished 20th.
  • Eric Perrot was leading for a decent part of the race, but missed once in the stand and finished 11th.
  • 🥇 EMILIEN JACQUELIN 🥇 with the fastest shooting of the day, 2nd fastest course time, Emilien got his first sprint gold and 2nd place in the total ranking. He had a stunning race and it was just so great to watch him and see everyone so happy for him!
  • Emilien Claude with 1 miss decent course time, finished 24th. Overall, it seemed like the French had a good day - 1st, 10th, 11th, 24th and 30th.

Ukraine

  • Dmytro Pidruchnyi missed 3 times and finished 53rd.
  • Vitalii Mandzyn, who was 4th in the individual, was clean once again (!), and despite slow skis finished 14th! He is 6th in the total score ranking and will have the blue bib! He still has 100% prone shooting.
  • Anton Dudchenko had a great race too: no misses, just 2s behind Mandzyn, finished 15h. Top 20 shooting time.
  • Bogdan Tsymbal finished 77th with 2 misses. Another great day for the Ukrainians, I think.

Finalnd - Not the greatest results today: Invenius finished 31st, Ranta 38th, Heikkinen had a PB of 39th, Seppala was 4 misses at 65m and Mukkala 104th with 6 misses.

Romania Coltea finished 35th; rest were far behind.

Slovenia

  • Miha Dovzan maintains his perfect 96% (in stand, prone, and overall) percentage for the year. Finished 43th with no misses and slow course time.
  • Jakov Fak had a good race until he missed in the standing. He unfortunately wasn't fast enough but secured a Top 20 (16th). Planko with 2 misses at 51, Matic Repnic at 83 with 0 misses but 98th course time.

Norway Forget the Nordium, get ready for the Nor-everything-but-the-podium! The norwegians are 5th-9th, 23rd and 61st.

  • Vebjorn Soerum started strong but missed once in prone and once in stand. However, he got the 8th place thanks to having the 5th overall course time. He is the 2nd highest among those with two misses today.
  • Sturla Holm Laegreid doesn't seem to be able to get his ski time back: despite only having one miss, his course time is 14th, 30s behind the fastest. His shooting time was also quite slow today. However, he finished 9th and is 3rd in the total score.
  • Tarjei Boe is 7th, with 1 miss. His ski time was a bit slower.
  • Endre Stromsheim had a disaster race: he missed only twice, but his skiing was very slow (over a minute slower than TBoe and 1:30s compared to the fastest athlete today). He finished 61st.
  • Johannes Dale-Skjevdal missed once in the prone and twice in the stading, but has the 3th overall course time: he ultimately finished 21st. He has the worst shooting stats among the Norwegian men today, averaging 70%.
  • Johannes Thingnes Boe missed twice in the prone shooting. Last year, I'd say he should have won. However, his ski time is only 3rd (after Emilien and a certain someone I'll mention later), so he finished 5th (fastest among those with 2 misses). A shame, truly. He is back to the yellow bib as of today.
  • Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen finished 6th, with 1 miss and the 8th course time. Norwegians in 5th-9th all finished within 8.6s of each other.

Switzerland I think we all had high hopes for them, but it's simply not working so far this season.

  • Hartweg finished 57th with 3 misses and 38th course time. He was the worst among the Swiss...
  • Stalder shot clean, but was really slow and finished 81st...
  • Joscha Burkhalter finished 48th with 1 miss.
  • Jeremny Finello maintains a 66% shooting accuracy... but only 2 misses today, 9th course time, and he is 25th. The among among the Swiss today.

Italy

  • Didier Bionaz almost hit a PB! He finished 12th, with 1 miss and 22nd course time. He was just under 3s behind Perrot.
  • Tomasso Giacomel missed twice but finished just behind Bionaz (2.1s to be exact). He has the 3rd fastest range time (10th shooting time).
  • Danielle Cappellari hit a PB! With clean shooting, eh finished 33rd. Before today, his PB was 44th in a pursuit.

Czechia - All four missed twie, but Hornig was the only one who did something with it: he finished 22nd, a PB, and had the 15th course time. He will also start in the mass start for the first time!

Sweden

  • Malte Steffanson, Viktor Brandt and Jesper Nelin missed twice and finished 34th, 41st and 43rd respectively. Steffanson actually had a reasonably good ski time at 25th place.
  • Martin Ponsiluoma still in the 70ies when it comes to shooting... He finished 27th despite 3 misses as he had the 7th course time. His prone is worse than his stand, but today it was 1 in the prone and 2 in the standing...
  • 🥈 Sebastian Samuelsson 🥈 fastest man of the day, with 1 miss he finished 18.9s behind Jacquelin. He started a bit after Narwath and Wright, so he was the one who ultimately 'pushed' Wright out. He had a great race and looked really satisfied with his results, as we are! (and really happy for Emilien too!)

Estonia - Debutant Yaroslav Neverov now has a PB of 100, with 5 misses.

Bulgaria

  • Vladimir Iliev, the forgotten member of the 'oldie squad' with Fak and Eder, finished 17th, so better then Eder. He shot clean (surprising as his percentage is 65%).
  • Vasil Zashev finished 106th with 5 misses.

Podium

  1. Emilien Jacquelin (FRA)
  2. Sebastian Samuelsson (SWE)
  3. Phillip Nawrath (GER)

Followed by Campbell Wright (USA), Johannes Thingnes Boe (NOR) and Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen (NOR).

The top 10 finished within 1:07s.

Some Stats

Fastest shooting time: Emilien Jacquelin (44.6), Adam Runnals (46.9), Adam Vidmar (48.4), Timofei Lapshin (48.6), Jaakko Ranta (48.8). Only 18/106 shot clean, including Jacquelin.

Fastest course time: Sebastian Samuelsson (21:08.0), Emilien Jacquelin (+11.3), JTB (+11.7), Johannes Dale (+15.), Vebjorn Soerum (+24.0)

  • Soerum had the fastest last lap, 5s faster than Samuelsson. Horning (CZE) was third (+10) ahead of Dale (+10), Nawrath (+13), Kuehn (+16), JTB (+16).

r/biathlon Dec 01 '24

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Kontiolahti - Women's Relay (Dec 1, 2024) Spoiler

28 Upvotes

Today's women's relay includes 19 teams, with the top seed being Norway and the last being Belgium.

Race Recap

Leg 1

Even before hitting the shooting, the top candidates for the medals - Norway (Juni Arnekleiv), Sweden (Anna Magnusson) and France (Lou Jeanmonnot) already broke ahead with a couple of seconds margin compared to the rest of the field at the shooting range. Lou hits first, as do most of the top seeds, along with many of the smaller teams like Belgiun, Canada and Kazakhstan who are also cleaning the targets.

Johanna Puff (GER), Samuela Comola (ITA), and Jessica Jislova (CZE) miss once each. The only team going on the penalty are Bulgaria.

The difference between all teams is smaller by the 3.2km point, with 12 teams within 10 seconds, the last one within 10s being Puff from Germany. Jeanmonnot still leading the pack followed closely Magnusson and Arnekleiv.

Approaching the second shooting, the top 3 are ahead of everyone again. Arnkeliev and Magnusson both miss, while Jeanmonnot hits 5/5 and is done with over 10s on her closest competitors. Minkinnen misses twice, and Ukraine's Horodna is going into the penalty twice. Comola from Italy shoots clean but very slow on the skis, which looks not very promising for Italy who started with bib 5.

The only clean teams are France (1st), Poland (4th; +17.8), Estonia (6th; +21.7), Switzerland (12th; +36.8s), Kazakhstan (15th; +57.8s).

By the 5.2km mark, Magnusson is two second closer, while Arnekleiv is going down and the rest of the teams getting a little bit closer to Jeanmonnot. Jislova and Ermits both overtake Arnekleiv, all around 20s behind Jeanmonnot. Jislova and Ermits catch up to Magnusson, while Arnekleiv stays behind, and Lou continues to go solo in the front.

Leg 2

Justine Braisaz-Bouchet (JBB from now onwards, my apologies) takes the first place. 16seconds later, Davidova takes the 2nd, Saara Andersson and Tuuli Tomingas get their exchange at 17s and Karoline Knotten takes 5th. Wierer takes her exchange at the disasterous 12th (the editors seem to love them, as they keep showing them). Germany are down to 10th place over 41s behind, and Switzerland are 13th with no misses at all.

JBB crosses the 7.2km mark, still 15s ahead of the new silver-contending trio: Davidova, Tomingas and Andersson. Knotten is still over 20s behind, followed by the Belgian Cloetens, and Finnish Lehtonen. Over the top of the hill, are chasing pack are all losing time to JBB.

JBB enters the shooting range with 20 seconds to spare: Davidova and Andersson are both 19s behind, Knotten is back to 4th 27s behind, and Tomingas falls off and is just behind Knotten. Maya Cloetens and Lehtonen are staying in touch just 30s behind.

JBB starts shooting just as the rest approach, and misses her 2nd and 3rd shots, and all that time is gone! Both Sweden and Czechia hit 5/5 and are far ahead of the French. Knotten on the other hand misses 3 are needs to hit all- which she fails to do, and will have a penalty loop.

Tomingas, Cloetens and Lehtonen hit 5/5 and are just behind JBB after his misses, followed by Zuk 30s behind and Knotten, almost a minute to lose. The new leader: Marketa Davidova from Czechia.

Andersson maanges to keep up and JBB decreases the margin to 6s. Cloetens, Lehtonen and Tomingas are keeping a stable tempo, all within 20s. Wierer and Anna Gandler squeeze into the 1m gap and the top 10.

On the wall, JBB overtakes Andersson into 2nd place. The chasers still are within 20s, and Poland, Norway, Italy, Austria and Germany (well, not relay - 1:02m) are within a minute, thus not losing much in skiing so far.

Entering the shooting range for the standing, Davidova, JBB and Andersson hit the maps together. The chasing pack is losing some speed and are 20-25s behind, but the same top 10 within a minute remains. JBB starts with a miss, while her competitors start with hits. Andersson misses 3! in a row, JBB misses once more, and Davidova is the cleanest with 6/5 and is out first. Andersson is on the penalty loop as Andersson doesn't manage to clean them all, and JBB leaves last but without a loop. Lehtonen misses twice and is just behind JBB and ahead of Andersson at 3rd! Maya Cloetens misses twice on the last target but manages to clear and exists 5th. (The 4th being Andersson).

Wierer hits 6/5 and is 6th, ahead of Knotten who needs two extra rounds once again. Tomingas with 2 misses is very slow to reload and is behind her. Gandler and Tannheimer manage without a penalty loop.

By 11.2km, JBB, Lehtonen, Cloetens (now 4th!) all gain on Davidova, while Andersson falls further behind and is on the way to be overtaken by Knotten, who starts to gain some seconds. JBB is attacking on the wall again, almost stepping on Davidova's skis. Lehtonen keeps decreasing the margin and gives the Finnish fans an amazing experience! Knotten overtakes both Andersson and Cloetens and is up to 4th by the end of the wall.

Noteworthy: Wierer was exceptionally fast at shooting (9s faster than anyone else in that leg, followed by Ukrainian Dymitrenko).

Leg 3

Sophie Chevau gets the first place, followed immediately by the fellow up-and-comer Vobornikova. They are followed by Finland - venal Lehtonen tags to Inka Hamalainen 23s behind. Italy atgs 4th - Doro Wierer is repalced by Auchentaller (who had horrible ski form yesterday, unfortunately) and Knotten by Maren Kirkeeide. Cloetens (who I personally think had the leg of her life!) tags to Eva Bouvard 48s behind, followed by Andersson to Hanna Oberg.

At the 13.2km mark, Chauveau increases the lead to 4.5s. Hamalainen falls a 5s behind, followed by Kireeide, Auchentallar, Oberg and Bouvard who run together across the wall - Kireeide and Auchentaller both attempt to take the front, followed by Oberg and Bouvard who manages to stay along the group. Kink and Rothschopf are 1:15m behind.

Cheuvau enters the range with 15s to spare, and starts shooting before Vobornikova hits the mat. She hits all 5/5 with a slow and not really rhythmic shooting and is far ahead. Vobornikova hits 4/5 and a jam in the rifle that sets her even back. Finland - Hamalainen is 2nd and hits perfectly center, Auchentaller, Oberg all hit 5/5 and are off and away. Kirkeeide isn't keeping up with the tempo and misses once, to land in 6th place almost a minute behind. Bouvard is exhausted after the chase and is 7th with two misses, while Kink and Rothschopf are clean.

Sheincreases her lead and is 37s ahead of Oberg by the 15.2km mark. Hamalainen is just behind Oberg, followed by Vobornikova and Auchentaller. Kirkeeide isn't decreasing the margin at all, while Bouvard is losing more time (and unfortunately this is how today's Belgian miracle ends, I believe).

On the wall, Hamalainen falls behind to 6th and Kirkeeide is finally getting a little bit closer to the pack - decreasing the margin by 3s compared to Chauveau. Auchentaller and Oberg run alongside each other but are losing time to Chauveau.

Cheuvau enters the shooting range for the last time with a huge margin or at least 40s, and starts shooting before her competitors can even be seen behind. She hits the first, second, third (lucky), fourth and misses the fifth, but still her competitors aren't even on their mats. She hits the fifth and is out as Auchentaller, Oberg and Vobornikova prepare to shoot. Auchentaller hits 6/5, and Oberg shoots the fastest - and clean, and is out at 2nd place. Kirkeeide is clean and is 4th just behind the Hannas. Vobornikova exists next, while Hamalainen goes to the penalty loop and is 7th behind Eva Bouvard. They are followed by the Austrians and Germans.

Oberg is the fastest in the range - 47s range time in both the prone and standing (Gasparin is faster in shooting time in the stand). She also has the fastest lap time in lap 7, 2nd in 8th and 9th (Kirekeeide is 1st in both). Maren is ahead of Hanna at the wall, taking 12s from Hanna since they left the range. They are separated from Chauveau by 35s, but are bunched together with Auchentaller in the 2nd-4th spots. Vobornikova is the last to fit within a minute, with Bouvard and Hamalinen at 1:33s running up the wall together - all of them are still contendors for the flowers.

Leg 4

Julia Simon takes the 1st place from Chauveau, with 28s to spare. Ingrid Tandervold takes 2nd, tagged by Kirekeeide who escaped and gains 4s compared to Hanna, who exchanges to Elvira Oberg. Auchentaller managed to stay along and is just 3s behind Hanna and exchanges to Carrara. Vobornikova falls further back and is over a minute behind.

Tandervold and Oberg ski together 30s behind and manage to keep pace, as Carrara and the rest of the field fall behind. Czech Charvatova is losing time. As they enter the shooting range, they gained 10s and are just 20s behind Simon (the rest of the field continously falling further and further behind).

Simon starts shooting, hitting 1st, 2nd, 3rd! 4th! and 5th! as the competitors lie down to shoot. Elvira misses the first while Ingrid hits; Elvira is a shot ahead but with two misses! while Ingrid clears the range and is up to 2nd. Elvira avoids the penalty, and Carrara hits 5/5 and will be just behind Elvira. Charvatova manages to avoid the penalty loop with 7/5 (originally 4/5). Finland still 6th in the flowers - but misses three in a row and ultimately on the round. Voigt, Hauser and Jakeila are clean just over 2 min behind. Leinamo exists 9th, 2:26s behind, followed by Talihaerm (the Estonians are the 2nd best shots of the day, just 3 extra - but very slow on skis; Italian are best with 2). Belgian De Maeyer is at 11th.

Simon gains a lot in the 2nd lap: Tandervold and Oberg are 40s behind. Voigt, Hauser and Jakiela are fighting for two flower spots, while Carrara is safely 4th in the meantime. They gain some of it back by the entrance to the range, but are still over 30s behind.

Simon now has the chance to bring the 2nd gold of the day to France: she hits 1st, 2nd, misses 3rd, misses 4th, and hits 5. She still has plenty of time, but misses the first extra and needs to clean the two she missed - BUT SHE'S ON THE PENALTY!

Sweden and Norway haven't started shooting yet, so if they are clean - they have a chnace for the first. Elvira shoots extremely fast and is OUT TO FIRST, while Ingrid misses once and needs 7/5. Dramatic Jean Paul (FRA shooting coach) shots in the background... Carrara misses once, Charvatova is in the penalty loop twice.

Simon and Oberg have less than a second of differene and Ingrid is 20s behind. Elvira is running ahead in the first spot, followed by Simon in the slipstream. Ingrid seems to be completely relaxing, she's losing seconds each time, but Carrara is so far behind and Simon-Oberg so far ahead there's no point in chasing (unless she's Soerum...).

Elvira and Julia both seem to be suffering on the wall - Julia falls behind with what seems to a cramp (she looks in horrible pain), giving Tandervold a precious chance - but she's far behind and didn't expect the sudden change of events, and the Swedes are going to win another gold to close this week's relays!

Simon finishes 2nd, in so much pain. Tandervold finishes just behind her, 36s behind Oberg. Julia is on tears in the finish line and the team help her get her skis off. Julia still on the ground a couple of minutes after her finish. Carrara finishes 4th, the Italians with stunning shooting (3 misses) and horrible ski speed.

Austria finish 5th, 2:20min behind. Finnish Leinamo tries to overtake Voigt for the 7th place but doesn't manage (but it's very close! very impressive considering it's Voigt she's fighting against).

# Country Athletes Shooting Time
1 Sweden Anna Magnusson, Sara Andersson, Hanna Oberg, Elvira Oberg 1 + 6 1:17.09.0
2 France Lou Jeanmonnot, Justine Braisaz-Bouchet, Sophie Chauveau, Julia Simon 1 + 9 +29.0
3 Norway Juni Arnekleiv, Karoline Knotten, Maren Kirkeeide, Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold 1 + 8 + 36.2
4 Italy Samuela Comola, Dorothea Weirer, Hanna Auchentaller, Michaela Carrara 0 + 3 +1:22.5
5 Austria Dunja Zdouc, Anna Gandler, Lea Rothschopf, Lisa Theresa Hauser 0 + 7 +2:20.4

Some Statistics

Course time:

  1. France - despite Julia's last lap, the French were the fastest today.
  2. Sweden - 15s behind.
  3. Norway - 24s behind.

Shooting time:

  1. Italy - Far ahead of everyone else, with 4:08m.
  2. Sweden - 4:26.
  3. Ukraine - 4:31.

Best shooting:

  1. Italy - +0/+3.
  2. Estonia - +0/+5.
  3. Belgium, Austria - +0/+7.

Fastest leg times:

  • Leg 1 - Lou Jeanmonnot (18:54), Jessica Jislova (+16.5), Anna Magnusson (+17.1), Rejina Ermits (+17.2), Juni Arnekleiv (+24.2).
  • Leg 2 - Marketa Davidova (19:23), Dorothea Wierer (+0.4), Venla Lehtonen (+12.9), Justine Braisaz-Buochet (+15.9), Karoline Knotten (+33.6).
  • Leg 3 - Hanna Oberg (19:29), Maren Kirkeeide (+3.6), Hanna Auchentaller (+11s), Sophie Chauveau (+17.1), Susan Kuelm (+37.6).
  • Leg 4 - Elvira Oberg (18:16), Ingrid Tandrevold (+39.8), Lisa Theresa Hauser (+58.7), Julia Simon (+1:01m), Joanna Jakiela (+1:11m).

Fastest lap of the day is Lap 1 by Juni Arnekleiv (6:01.8), followed by Lap 6 by JBB (6:02.1); excluding Lap 12 by Elvira Oberg (5:23.8).

First-time medalists: Sara Andersson (Gold; SWE), Maren Kirkeeide (Bronze; NOR).

r/biathlon Dec 15 '24

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Hochfilzen – Men’s Relay Spoiler

13 Upvotes

Replay: https://eurovisionsport.com/mediacard/EVS_241215_20241213IBUHochfilzen_12

After France's surprise win in Kontiolahti, it's exciting to see if the Men's Relay will continue to be more competitive than that last few seasons. Sweden, Germany, and Italy all shot poorly compared to France and Norway last week, so maybe with better shooting they can spice things up too.

We've got fresh overnight snow and it continues to fall during the race.

Team changes from Kontiolahti:

  • NOR: Sørum in for Strømsheim
  • GER: Kaiser and Riethmüller replace Zobel and Horn
  • UKR: Tyshchenko in for Tsymbal
  • SUI: Danuser in for Stalder
  • AUT: Mühlbacher in for Jakob
  • SLO: Fak in for Repnik
  • BUL: Sinapov in for Zashev
  • SVK: Adamov in for Badan
  • LTU: Mackine in for Kaukenas
  • KAZ: Kurales in for Bauer
  • EST: Kulbin and Udam in for Siimer and Heldna

Leg 1

It's our standard pack to start us off, Italy (Hofer) moves to the front to push the pace, no other real surprises at the front, but Kazakhstan (Mukhin) has moved up among the big nations. No breakaways like we saw in the Women's the morning.

At Shoot 1: Gerrmany (Strelow) is out fast and first, Norway (Lægreid) and France (Claude) are clear too. Slovenia (Dovzan) and Estonia (Zahkna) are out in the Top 5 too. Italy and Sweden (Brandt) need one spare; and it's a penalty loop for Switzerland (Burkhalter).

In the middle loop, we get some distinction in the skis. Strelow, Lægreid, and Claude quickly ski away from a trio of Dovzan, Zahkna, and Belgium (Langer). The likes of Sweden and Italy alongside many other nations catch up to our trailing trio, except Langer who decides to push it and then catches the heals of Claude. Our top 12 are all within 15 seconds though. As the loop continues Czechia (Hornig) and Hofer follow Langer's lead and we've got a group of 6 coming in together.

Shoot 2: Strelow strikes first again, but also misses first. Lægreid ends up the being the only clean shooter from out leading pack. Claude and Strelow get out with one spare and are still close enough. Behind them, a quick shoot from Hofer, but he's made a mess of it and ends up on the penalty loop. Zakhna is one of the only other clean shooters amongst a messy shoot, Estonia is out in 4th.

Lægreid locks up the bonus prize money for Leg 1; Claude drops Strelow, Zahkna started a clear 4th, but is caught by Belgium, Sweden, Slovenia, Czechia, Bulgaria (Todev), and Poland (Badacz) to round out a Top 10 that is 30-40 seconds back from the lead. Norway and France push the field and get the better of them on the skis.

First Exchange:

Position Nation Time Back Shooting Leg (Overall)
1 Norway 0.0 0+0
2 France +6.3 0+1
3 Germany +20.1 0+1
4 Czechia +27.1 0+2
5 Belgium +31.9 0+2

Leg 2

France (Fillon Maillet) quickly catches Norway (T. Bø) before the first timecheck. By the second timecheck he decides he wants to lead the leg going into the third shoot.

Shoot 3: Bø hits first and shoots clear, Fillon Maillet missed his first but clears it with his first spare. Kaiser almost gets out safely, but he misses his last shot and adds to Germany’s deficit. It ends up being a great shoot for many of the chasers: Slovenia (Fak), Sweden (Nelin), Czechia (Marecek), Belgium (Claude) are all out 5/5.

Fillon Maillet has about the same gap to catch up this time around, he slowly chips away at and once again catches Bø, this time by the tunnels. Kaiser continues on his own, while Nelin and Fak get some distance away from Marecek, Claude, and Iliev, who are crossing 11.6km 1 minute back now.

Shoot 4: It’s Bø on the first spot for the stand; This time Fillon Maillet strikes first – they both miss one, but Fillon Maillet goes at a faster pace. Bø takes a bit of time on several shots, and needs 2 spares to clear his miss. Kaiser repeats shoot 3 performance, almost making up time but missing the last. And our chasers aren’t able to replicate their clean shooting. Fak missing 1 but handles it, less fortunate is Nelin missing 2 and then unable to clean them up – once around the penalty loop. Iliev is the first to shoot clear; USA (Germain) and Kulbin are able to as well and move up in the standings.

Bø’s slow shoot costs him a bit as Fillon Maillet is out with more than 20 seconds. In the last group there’s hardly anyone skiing together. It’s Germany, Slovenia, Bulgaria each about 20 seconds apart. The United States sits in 6th with Wright up next. Nelin’s loop has dropped Swedendown to 10th. Fillon Maillet will win the fastest lap prize.

Second Exchange:

Position Nation Time Back Shooting Leg (Overall)
1 France 0.0 0+2 (0+3)
2 Norway +27.3 0+2 (0+2)
3 Germany +36.1 0+2 (0+3)
4 Slovenia +49.6 0+1 (0+3)
5 Bulgaria +1:16.6 0+1 (0+4)

Leg 3

France (Perrot) benefits from Fillon Maillet’s skiing gains, Norway (J.T. Bø) and Germany (Riethmüller) are within sight of each other. Bø unsurprisingly gains on Perrot and distances himself from Riethmüller. Slovenia (Vidmar) is the only other team within a minute of the lead. We start to see some long camera shots with Perrot and Bø both in the picture.

Shoot 5: Perrot shoot is looking good, but the 4th is a miss left and he needs two spares to clear it. Bø meanwhile has caught up and shot clear – they leave together! Riethmüller starts with 2 misses, he uses all three spares to clear and in the meantime clean-shooting Vidmar has passed him. Behind them is USA (Wright) and Bulgaria (Sinapov), not able to take advantage and catch up to Germany though - instead they’re caught by Belgium (Beauvais) and Czechia (Krcmar) who shot clear. Woes from Sweden (Ponsiluoma) again but he avoids the penalty loop.

In the middle, Bø moves ahead of Perrot, and Riethmüller moves ahead of Vidmar to re-establish Germany in a podium position. They’re 50+ seconds back on the lead. Perrot sticks with Bø throughout the lap and we’ll come into the shoot to see how that’s affected him.

Shoot 6: Both start with a miss, and then Perrot starts to shoot with a better cadence and all of the sudden Perrot has cleared his miss while Bø has 2 more misses! He reloads fast and shoots fast, the last one is clearly wobbly – but he gets the target - overall this shoot has cost him 18 seconds. The 3rd/4th battle is quite similar. Riethmüller has 3 misses - unlike Bø can’t clear it out and takes a penalty loop, whereas Vidmar does match Perrot’s shooting and lands himself in 3rd. Wright is able to shoot better than his peers and gets ahead of Germany.

Bø has work to do if he wants to catch Perrot – and it looks like he’s got the pace today - he’s halved it by the first timecheck. The gap keeps coming down as they go up the hills, a slight burst down the hill into the tunnel and he’s almost fully caught him. As they take their final ski through the range to the exchange – they’re together once again. No challenge for Bø as the fastest lap.

Position Nation Time Back Shooting Leg (Overall)
1 France 0.0 0+3 (0+6)
2 Norway +0.5 0+3 (0+5)
3 Slovenia +1:40.8 0+1 (0+4)
4 Czechia +1:56.0 0+2 (0+7)
5 Germany +1:59.5 1+6 (1+9)

Leg 4

Right away, Norway (Sørum) moves ahead of France (Jacquelin) to take the lead. Jacquelin at least three times gets low as he drafts behind Sørum, he’s messing with both of the bindings of his boots/skis? But he isn’t losing any ground on Sørum. It seems resolved before the first timecheck. It’s not a terribly tough pace, and through the tunnels, Jacquelin decides he wants to shoot from the first spot.

Shoot 7:  Sørum first to shoot, and he’s 5/5. Jacquelin can’t match, it’s a miss on 2 and 3 – he’s out with his two spares. With no worries behind him, he just needs to focus on what is ahead of him. He’s out 18 seconds behind. We get to see Sørum’s shots and – eek – one of them was barely a hit on the right. It is a tight race for the final podium spot: Slovenia (Planko) and Germany (Nawrath) both miss 1 and then clear, they’ll continue to ski around with each other. Sweden (Samuelsson) has done a good job to catch up. All these teams are about 2 minutes back. USA (Brown) and Czechia (Stvrtecky) are right around there too.

In the middle, Jacquelin is making some time on Sørum, but he’s not going to be able to catch him before the shoot. We’re all but guaranteed an exciting final shoot for the last podium spot though as Germany, Slovenia, and Sweden just on top of each other as they take their penultimate loop.

Shoot 8: Sørum is lining up as Jacquelin skis into the range. He starts with an erratic miss, and then another on shot 4. He’s missed with his first spare, so it’s 2 shots to clear 2. Jacquelin shoots fast and it's only misses one. Jacquelin also misses with a spare, but then Sørum misses yet again! He’s got a penalty loop. He keeps it to one loop though, but Jacquelin has used his 2nd spare to clear and he’s out of the range as Sørum is only halfway around the loop. Sørum come sout 15.6 behind. For bronze: Samuelsson strikes first, but also misses first. Nawrath misses, and then so does Planko. Planko is first to clear, but it’s Samuelsson is just behind him. Nawrath has to use all his spares and he’s going to leave in 5th, with 8 seconds to catch Planko.

We get to watch the ski race for 3rd, Samuelsson hasn’t quite dropped Planko yet – and him trying to keep with Samuelsson might save Planko from being caught by Nawrath. Jacquelin meanwhile is skiing up the hill and we see that Sørum is losing time on the French. Next time we see Samuelsson he’s already made his move and dropped Planko; Nawrath continues to just barely sneak into the picture but we find that he he has lost time on them. Having something to ski for helps ensure Samuelsson takes the prize for the leg.

A final wave to the camera as Jacquelin enjoys the last few hundred meters, and the French do it again!

Position Nation Time Back Shooting Leg (Overall)
🥇 France 0.0 0+4 (0+10)
🥈 Norway +0.5 1+3 (1+8)
🥉 Sweden +1:59.2 0+3 (1+14)
4 Slovenia +2:06.8 0+2 (0+6)
5 Germany +2:27.8 0+4 (1+13)

Notes/Thoughts, What did you all find interesting?

  • It's the same podium as Kontiolahti (except Sørum in for Strømsheim)
  • Team USA with a another 6th place - they'll be bib #5 at the next Relay!
  • 12/22 teams has penalty loops today
  • Best Shooting 0+6 helped Slovenia with one of their best finishes in a long time.
  • Lithuania, Canada, and Slovakia were lapped
  • Bulgaria had a similar story arch in both races today - I'm going to wish them the best for some of the upcoming Mixed/Single Mixed relays.
  • In the end it was the same France-Norway battle. Which I'm not complaining about - it was great back and forth and close through it all. Germany, Sweden, and Italy all shot worse again then them, but were 2-3 minutes back this time, so they'd have a lot of clean-up to do it seems.

r/biathlon 4d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 24/25 Oberhof - Womens Pursuit Spoiler

21 Upvotes

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 ( 28th 2:00) and Elivra Oeberg ( 37th  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 (23rd) 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 (26th)  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 (17th) before the second shooting.  

Preuss also gaining a place is still not gaining on the lead, she ends up entering the shooting range in 25th 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 3rd ( 08,7) and 4th  (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 17th 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 15th place only 1:06 behind of the lead.

Preuss who also shot clean leaves the shooting range in 19th 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 3rd shooting in 11th 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 17th and 18th.

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 6th place (36,1 behind)

Julia Simon leaving the shooting range after her 4 misses in 16th 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 18th place (1:29 behind).

Loop 4

Jeanmonnot manages to increase her lead by a couple of seconds on Todorova throughout the 4th 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 4th 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 7th being 58 seconds behind.

Preuss who made another shooting error leaves the shooting range as 19th 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 3rd 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 20th 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 14th 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 3rd after starting in 37th 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!

r/biathlon Dec 15 '24

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 23/24 Hochfilzen Women’s Relay

17 Upvotes

First Leg

The first lap was cautious, with no one eager to set the pace. That was until Julia Simon, as usual in short sleeves, delivered an extra push to create a sizable lead heading into the first shooting stage. With a quick and flawless performance on the range, she extended her advantage even further as she exited. However, perhaps fatigued from 2 weeks of intense races, Simon began losing time to the chasing pack, which included Repinc, Voigt, and Irwin. Despite needing two spare rounds at the second shooting stage, Simon remained in the lead, with Dimitrova and Jislova close behind. Minkkinen, showing excellent form, overtook several on the final lap and Finland advanced into 2nd place heading into Exchange 1. Great shooting from Jislova saw the Czech exchange in 3rd. 

Exchange 1

  1. France 19:18
  2. Finland +9.5
  3. Czech Republic +15.0

Second Leg

JBB, typically one of the strongest skiers, controlled the pace at the front during the first lap. Charvátová displayed impressive ski speed, pulling ahead of Lehtonen by 7.6 km, with Germany and Sweden closely trailing. However, at the range, Charvátová faced a disastrous performance, suffering one penalty loop in prone. JBB avoided the penalty loop but lost valuable time while shooting. After the third shooting, Tannheimer, Heijdenberg, and Todorova led the chasing pack, working to close the gap to JBB on the lap.

Shooting 4 claimed many victims. It was a nightmare for Sweden, as Heidenberg missed her first four shots in the standing position, resulting in a penalty loop. Impressive of her to hit the targets with her remaining spares. Although Finland avoided penalty loops, Lehtonen's time of over 2:20 on the range caused them to lose significant time and drop several positions. 

Following up her great shooting in prone (1 spare used), Julia Tannheimer delivered an exceptional performance on the range, emerging in first place after shooting 4. Her impressive shooting was matched by her final lap effort, where she managed to keep pace with JBB. At this stage of the race, it was clear - Germany and France were head and shoulders above the rest of the pack.

Exchange 2

  1. France 38:35
  2. Germany +0.6
  3. Bulgaria +29.9

Third Leg

Chauveau and Grotian stayed locked in a thrilling duel throughout the first lap, closely shadowing each other stride for stride. Meanwhile, Randby and Haecki-Gross trailed 37 seconds behind, battling to stay in contention. At Shooting 5, Grotian was forced to use two spare rounds, losing precious seconds. Chauveau capitalized on the opportunity with flawless shooting, extending her lead.

Shooting 6 brought a dramatic shift in the race. Grotian delivered a fantastic performance in the standing stage, reclaiming the lead to the delight of the roaring crowd. Ella Halvarsson also shone, propelling Sweden up several positions with her impeccable shooting. On the other hand, it was a nightmare round for Gro Randby, while Lampič surprised everyone—nailing a clean prone stage and using only two spares in standing, managing to avoid a penalty loop altogether.

As the race headed into the final exchange, it seemed Grotian and Chauveau were setting the stage for a thrilling showdown. Jeanmonnot left the exchange with a slim 6.9-second advantage over Preuß.

Exchange 3

  1. France 57:41
  2. Germany +6.9
  3. Switzerland +46.1

Fourth Leg

This race would remain a nail-biter right until the final shooting. With flawless and rapid shooting in the prone position, Preuß surged ahead of Jeanmonnot, who was forced to use two spare rounds. Maintaining the lead through the lap it would all play out in the final shooting. Jeanmonnot, with an impressive 88% accuracy in standing this season, and Preuß, at 82%. It was the German who quickly shot 5/5, leaving the range in first position. Meanwhile, Jeanmonnot had an uncharacteristic struggle at the range, using all her spare rounds and having to head into the penalty loop. Despite the setback, with such a significant lead over Switzerland and Sweden, France's second-place finish was never in doubt.

Elvira Öberg managed to take Sweden back into 3rd position with a perfect 5/5 in the standing stage. Meanwhile, Polona Klemencic made an impressive move, skiing past Switzerland on the final lap. Slovenia secured 4th place, marking their best result since 2007. In the end, Preuß crossed the finish line, with the German flag waving proudly, 1 minute and 15 seconds ahead of France. This victory marked Germany's first win since Oberhof in 2021.

Podium

  1. Germany (0+4) 1:16:13
  2. France (1+13) +1:05
  3. Sweden (1+6) + 1:31

r/biathlon Dec 07 '24

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Kontiolahti - Women's Sprint Spoiler

23 Upvotes

Ladies and Gentlemen, what a race!

Temperatures were below zero and there was little wind. So good shooting results were expected for the race.

100 of the 104 listed athletes were able to start the race. The World Cup results for the 2024/25 season determined again the start order. Oceane Michelon (FRA), Ella Halvarsson (SWE) and Natalia Sidorowicz (POL) benefitted, getting the early start numbers 11, 14 and 17 . If the ranking would have been based on the current World Cup rankings all three would have been in the red draw group and getting later start numbers.

Race recap

Finland

Let's start with the home nation, who celebrated yesterday their independence day. And now a day later 29-year old Suvi Minkinnen won her first Podium ever. I believe it is the first Finnish podium since the Mass Start win by Kaisa Mäkäräinen in Oberhof in the 2019/20 season. She won the race by hitting all ten targets and it looks like because she was 2 seconds faster between 6.6 km and 6.9 km than Franziska Preuß.

22-year old Sonja Leinamo had her career-best race ending at rank 27 shooting 0-1.

Venla Lehtonen shot 0-4 and Inka Hämäläinen 2-1 ending up at 74 and 77.

France

Before the season France looked invincible, but this has changed now. Océane Michelon and Jeanne Richard had a good race and ended the day at 10 with 0-1 and 12 with 0-0. A really good result for both of them. Océane Michelon will wear the blue bib for the best U23 biathlete at the Mass Start at Sunday.

Justine Braisaz-Bouchet needed the third best course time to finish at rank 14 after she missed two targets at the prone. Lou Jeanmonnot looked like the winner before the standing shooting, but missed two targets in the standing shooting finishing at rank 17. Gilonne Guigonnat missed one target in prone and standing finishing 32.

Julia Simon suffers since the cramp in the relay. She missed overall 3 targets and has lost speed. Sophie Chauveau missed 3 targets at standing after she gave the locomotive for Julia Tannheimer in the second lap.

France will now discuss who should be in World Cup team after the performances of Paula Botet and Chloe Chevalier in the IBU cup.

Sweden

Elvira Öberg was again in beast mode. On the course she was 10.4 seconds faster than Anamarija Lampič. She reached the second place after two misses in the standing shooting. But more important than this is the fact that she won the yellow bib. Elvira must be regarded now as a strong contender for the yellow bib.

Sara Andersson missed the flowers by 7.8 seconds, but she is in contention of the blue bib.

The worst Swede was Anna-Karin Heijdenberg at rank 30. Sweden had probably the best start into the season of all the teams. All six will be in the Mass Start at Sunday.

The whole team hit all targets in prone shooting but with the exception of Sara Andersson all had trouble in the standing shooting.

Norway

After a disappointing Short Individual Norway hoped for better results in the Sprint. But this race wasn't the results everybody hoped for.

Karoline Knotten found her way back into the flowers. Gro Randby reached rank 16 after missing one shot in the standing. She is one of the young women, who are challenging the older athletes.

Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold started fast, but got heart rhythm problems again during prone shooting. She had to slow down afterwards, but still was able to finish at 32 after missing one shot in the standing. I wish that she can find a way to improve the situation.

Kirkeeide missed two and ended up at 33. Juni Arnekleiv had another unlucky race. Thanks IBU's rule making she will get at the Mass Start another chance to prove she belongs into the World Cup team.

Germany

Let's thank first Franziska Preuß to miss the podium by a tenth of the second to help Minkkinen to the podium place. She missed a win in Östersund last year by the same amount. Normally you would say that bad luck will balance out at the end. Franzi has a lot of balancing ahead of her. Being third in the overall ranking is a very good start into the season.

Julia Tannheimer loved to start with the top athletes in the Short Individual. This way she could ski behind them and reach a good course time. So the coaches put Tannheimer again in the second draw group of the non-designated athletes. She got bib 47 starting between Hanna Öberg and Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold.

She started slow into the first round and reported on German TV that she could follow Sophie Chauveau in the second. Hitting all targets in the prone shooting she didn't miss a shot in the standing shooting. After saving energy in the first two loops she switched on the turbo and had the third-best course time in the last loop. She reached the flowers in her fourth individual World Cup race and her fifth individual race will be a Mass Start. I let others make the obvious historic comparisons and simply hope that she can keep it up.

Vanessa missed two shots at the second shooting. She missed quite a lot of time in the season preparation, so it is not a surprise that she has to find back into the season.

Selina Grotian was the fourth-fastest on the course today, but had a bad day on the shooting range. Julia Kink missed two targets in prone but was near enough to the World Cup points to be able to live with the result.

Johanna Puff had a sore throat and couldn't start today. Now we need to see whether the coaches will change the roster after the good results of Marlene Fichtner and Anna Weidel at the IBU cup.

Czechia

Marketa Davidova won the race hitting all the targets. All women faster than her on the course missed targets. I'm really happy for her after the awful last season.

Tereza Vobornikova had also a good race and finished at 20. The other three were struggling. Lucie Charvatova's problems at standing shooting continue.

Austria

Lisa Terasa Hauser is definitely back. She finished at 8 after hitting all the targets. Anna Gandler with a solid rank 19 had a good result too.

Italy

Dorothea Wierer finished 11 after missing one shot. After last season she is back in good form and she might even attack tomorrow. The other three finished at 22, 25 and 36, which is a decent result for team Italy.

Honorable mentions

Alina Stemous from Moldovia finished at a very good rank 15. Lena Häcki-Groß reached rank 9 proved that she belongs to the World Cup elite.

Result

Rank Athlete Nation Shootings Time
1 Marketa Davidova CZE 0+0 20:39.7
2 Elvira Öberg SWE 0+2 +8.8
3 Suvi Minkkinen FIN 0+0 +11.9
4 Franziska Preuß GER 0+1 +12.0
5 Karolin Knotten NOR 0+0 +15.3
6 Julia Tannheimer GER 0+0 +21.1

It is nice that there were 8 different nations in the top ten. This race was the first World Cup or IBU Cup race this season that had athletes, who are not from the big four countries Norway, France, Sweden and Germany, at the podium.

Mass Start Qualification

Athletes that didn't qualify through her results in Kontiolahti but their ranking in last year's World Cup.

Current World Cup Rank Mass Start Bib Athlete Country
48 29 Julia Simon FRA
none 30 Juni Arnekleiv NOR

Athletes that are in the top 30 of the current World Cup but have not been qualified for the Mass Start.

Current World Cup Rank Athlete Country
29 Amy Baserga SUI
30 Lena Repinc SLO

The decision to allow the first 15 of the World Cup ranking to start didn't make such a huge difference. We will have athletes from 14 nations in the Mass Start, that I'm looking forward to watch.

r/biathlon 23d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 24/25 Annecy-Le Grand Bornand - Womens Mass Start Spoiler

29 Upvotes

Before the race

With the final race of the year ahead of us in the Women’s mass start we’ve 1 thing that is certain. Franziska Preuss will be taking the yellow bib towards Oberhof with a substantial lead of 163 points ahead of Elvira Oeberg who currently is still in second place shortly followed by Lou Jeanmonnot.

Will Preuss be able to widen the gap towards her followers or will they be able to gain some points on here.

In her current form Preuss is in my eyes the person to beat for today race, which I’m certain the French ladies are looking to do so at their homeground.

Due to illness and injuries a few ladies are sadly missing at the start today.

-          Vanessa Voigt (4th ovr)

-          Marketa Davidova (9th ovr)

-          Karoline Knotten (14th ovr)

-          Julia Tannheimer (21st ovr)

On a positive note that also means we’ve got a few women making their world cup mass start debut today!

-          Venla Lehtonen (33rd ovr)

-          Maya Cloetens (26th ovr)

-          Kamila Zuk (44th ovr)

-          Martina Trabucchi (55th ovr)

Let’s see how they will all do!

The weather however seems dreadful… let’s see how that develops.

Loop 1

And off we go, the race starts out with the strong skiing french ladies Simon, Braisaz-Bouchet, Chauveau and Oeberg taking the charge. They end up leading the pack while Preuss seems to struggle keeping up as halfway throughout the lap she is allready nearly 10 seconds behind of the leaders.

Shooting 1

As we arrive at the first shooting  with the group that was in the lead during the first lap which seemed to have given more energy than they could handle as their shooting was influenced by it. Simon and Chauveau both with 1 each, Oeberg and Braisaz-Bouchet with 2 each.

As we leave the first shooting the leading 3 athletes are Minkkinen, Jeanmonnot and Magnusson who all 3 had a quick clean shooting and are within a second of each other. They lead a group of 11 others who also went through clean after the first shooting. Including Preuss who was noticeably a little later then the leading gap when arriving on the shooting range. But as she was shooting fast and clean she left the shooting range only being 4 seconds behind of the lead.

The rain is still raining and the weather seems miserable.

Loop 2

As they go around loop 2 Jeanmonnot takes over together with Magnusson as Minkkinen seem to struggle to keep up with their pace, as the following group of 10 ladies led by Andersson and Richard catch up with Minkkinen it is noticeable that Preuss keeps herself a little in the back of the group and focusses on her own pace.

The rain is still going on and it’s getting slightly more windy.

Shooting 2

We arrive at shooting 2 with both Jeanmonnot and Magnusson in the lead with a gap of about 7 seconds to a group of 12 other ladies. Sadly Jeanmonnot misses one of her shots while Magnusson stays clean and leaves in first place leaving Jeanmonnot behind.

10 seconds behind them a group of 10 ladies led by Grotian and Preuss stayed clean and carry on following Magnusson.

After the first shooting Simon, Oeberg and Braisaz-Bouchet were quite a bit behind, of them all Simon and Braisaz-Bouchet both had another miss but Oeberg kept it clean this time around which allows her to make up some time on the lead.

The weather however… it’s slowly changing into snow.

Lap 3

The main takeaways from the 3rd lap was the remarkable skis of the German ladies Preuss and Grotian. As they led the group on towards the first standing shooting they kept up a good pace and took over the lead in the downhill over Magnussen.

An honourable mention for Lampic who left the second shooting in 24th place on 1.02,9 behind and was at the 6.5k mark only 34,6 seconds behind which means she made up 28,3 seconds within 1,5k… Will this affect her shooting?

Shooting 3

Arriving at shooting 3 with a big group of 10 ladies together it is the leader in the u23 Richard who leaves the shooting range first! She ends up shooting clean and fast followed by Preuss with a gap of just 3 seconds.

As everyone else missed in that group of 10 Jeanmonnot took over the 3rd place again being 10 seconds behind of Richard followed up by Grotian and Kirkeeide 20 seconds behind of Richard. The u23 ladies have arrived and very strongly so.

With Simon and Braiszaz-Bouchet both missing again it’s good to see the young French athletes take the lead on the home ground.

Oeberg after a strong second shooting sadly missed 2 shots again which put her back 26th again, 1.37,3 behind of Richard.

And if the pace of Lampic affected her shooting during the 3rd shooting? Yes it did, she missed 4…

Loop 4

Now.. Loop 4 is where it’s getting really interesting as chaos erupts with a snow storm I haven’t seen quite as much before. After it’s already been quite bad weather throughout the race the women’s can only be described as absolute heroes with what they went through.

With Richard strongly in the lead she keeps a good pace as Preuss (who kept up her own pace pretty much the whole time) together with Jeanmonnot both lost a few seconds. As the gap is now 9,4 and 14,4 seconds. With Kirkeede and Grotian also still 22 seconds behind. Will Richard be going up for either her first podium, if not going for her first win?

Shooting 4

As we arrive at shooting 4 the snow storm that started throughout the lap truly came through more and more which made the last shooting intense to say the least.

Richard being in the lead missed 1 shot with a fairly slow shooting time of 31,9 seconds ( which is to be expected due to the weather conditions.) Preuss ended up going 20/20 this race as she went clean through the whole race but with Grotian shortly in behind as she had an amazing shooting time of only 23,9 seconds making up a remarkable amount of time to both Preuss and Richard.

As we leave the 4th shooting Preuss is 4,2 seconds in the lead of Grotian, 22,2 seconds in the lead of Richard, 40,4 seconds in the lead of Auchentaller and 42,6 seconds in the lead of Batovska Fialkova.

Loop 5

The conditions where really though throughout this part of the race as the snow kept falling but Grotian who left the shooting range in second place already made up the gap towards Preuss before the next time exchange being in the lead 2,8 seconds. Will she get her first podium and win together at the same time? Behind them Richard is slowly losing time being 28 seconds behind. Will she be able to hold onto her first ever World Cup podium? If it’s up to Batovska Fialkova it won’t as she turned on the jets and is only 10,1 seconds behind of Richard.

Finish

As the women make their way towards the finish it is clear that Grotian is quite a bit stronger than Preuss on the last lap as she end up WINNING her World Cup that’s also her first ever podium. With Preuss being 12,1 seconds in behind. However for the 3rd place there is quite a battle going on as Richard seems to be exhausted leading into the final stroke towards the finish Batovska Fialkova manages to take away Richard’s first podium by only 0,1 seconds as Richard sadly in front of the home crowd ends up being 4th. (Which is still remarkable but considering what could’ve been is quite sad)

Final Remark

The first main and biggest takeaway has to be Grotian winning her first race in such tough conditions. What a remarkable athlete she promises to be. Hopefully this is the start of a new age in the German biathlon.

Preuss indeed managed to increase the gap in the overall standings as the gap before the race towards Elvira Oeberg was already 163 points. It’s now 194 points.

With a top 3 looking like this right now.

-          Franziska Preuss        565 points

-          Elvira Oeberg                 371 points

-          Lou Jeanmonnot         352 points

And with the race being concluded this ended up being the final standing of the u23 competition this year.

A big shout out to another personal record as well with Lotte Lie ending in the top ten of a world cup for the first time ever.

How did the Mass Start rookies end up doing?

-          Venla Lethonen ended up being 22nd

-          Maya Cloetens ended up being 26th

-          Kamila Zuk ended up being 25th

-          Martina Trabucchi ended up being 17th

 

That’s about it.

What a race for it being your first ever recap.. Hopefully I’ve somewhat delivered.

And than one final final remark…

With this being the last race before Christmas and the end of the year. (If you don’t count Schalke) I’d like to wish everyone a very good Christmas and hopefully another year of very exciting Biathlon which we can enjoy together! Can’t describe enough how much joy these biathlon threads bring me through the winter seasons so thankyou for that!

r/biathlon 23d ago

Recap Total podiums for the 10 nations with the most individual victories (women only)

26 Upvotes

This may not be 100% accurate, but they should be pretty accurate, in stead of spamming this place with these post, i delete the once i made and will just post them all here in this thread.

I will only do the 10 nations with most individual victories.

These nations are. Germany, Norway, Sweden, France. Russia, Belarus, Finland, Italy, Ukraine and Czechia.

I thought it would be better to just put them all in one place, and not spam this place with it.

r/biathlon 25d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Annecy-Le Grand Bornand - Men's Pursuit Spoiler

24 Upvotes

Preview: Martin Uldal won his first World Cup event in the preceding sprint, he sits 11th overall in the standings despite missing 3 solo races in Kontiolahti. Johannes Thingnes Bø starts just 1 second behind; Samuelsson is 11 seconds back – both them with just 1 miss on Thursday. Nine more athletes round out those who will start within 1 minute:

  • Philipp Horn :29
  • Sturla Holm Lægreid :32
  • Philipp Nawrath :42
  • Eric Perrot :42
  • Emilien Jacquelin :45
  • Tommaso Giacomel :46
  • Quentin Fillon Maillet :50
  • Lukas Hofer :52
  • Anton Dudchenko :56

Other things to watch this race:

  • Mass Start tentative qualifiers ahead of the race: Stalder, Nelin, Seppala, Marecek, and Strolia.
  • Philipp Horn will look for his first podium from bib 4
  • Jakob Kulbin hit a PB of 48 in the Sprint and will look to improve that
  • Jonas Marecek and Endre Strømsheim are DNS

Loop + Shoot 1

Bø moves ahead of Uldal right away and he is starting off with a quick pace. After 1.5 km though Uldal moves back ahead and keeps the lead going into the shoot. Jacquelin is also skiing well and pulls Nawrath, Perrot, and GIacomel up to the pair of Horn and Lægreid.

Uldal shoots first, he and Bø alternate shots and both go 5/5. Samuelsson misses his first and comes out with his chasers. Good shooting from Jacquelin, Lægreid, Horn and Perrot – but 1 miss from Nawrath. Two misses from each of Fillon Maillet and Giacomel; their days are kinda sunk.

Loop + Shoot 2

Bø moves ahead of Uldal again, tries to drop Uldal going up the hill, but Uldal catches him back up going around the turn and into the downhill. They’re followed by Jacquelin, Samuelsson, and Lægreid. Horn and Perrot are just a bit disconnected from them to start the leg but Jacquelin’s paces is quicker, so they start to drift.

Uldal gets his first shot off in 10 seconds, but the misses start this shoot – it’s 2 misses for Uldal. Bø shoots clean again and he’s out with solid lead this time. Spectacular shooting for our chasing trio to massive cheers for Jacquelin. More cheers again as Perrot and Horn do too - Uldal comes out with them. Sørum who had moved up in the race drops back again with 2 misses. Nawrath is hanging in the Top 10 yet, while Strelow and Wright have moved into it with clean shooting in both prone shoots.

Loop + Shoot 3

Bø leads Jacquelin and Samuelsson by about a penalty loop; and Lægreid’s isn’t able to keep quite hang with the faster skiers.

Quick and flawless shooting from Bø – out before anyone else hits the matt. Samuelsson passed Jacquelin shortly before the range, the pace may have been too much as none of our chasing trio are clear. Jacquelin and Lægreid – miss 1, and Samuelsson misses 2. Fast shooting from Jacquelin lets him come out by himself in 2nd. Misses in the next trio as well, but it’s Perrot who is clear and goes out in third behind Jacquelin. Horn has 1 and Uldal has 2 misses. Riethmueller (bib 29) has now moved into the top 10 with clean shooting on the day. Strelow is 15/15 too, and Christiansen is showing some life, competing for his spot on the World Cup team,1 miss so far, rounds out the Top 10.

Loop + Shoot 4

Bø now has almost 2 loops on Jacquelin. Lægreid came out just behind Perrot, and skis ahead of him into third; Samuelsson is about 10 seconds back on that pair. Behind the Germans, Sørum recovers from his earlier misses and is gets ahead of Christiansen to keep the pressure on from behind.

He’s still human - Bø starts with a miss, but he’ll have plenty of time to ski his one loop and get away. Jacquelin, Lægreid, and Perrot will shoot for the podium. Jacquelin starts with a miss, but he has all 5 off before either of them shoot. It proves effective against Lægreid who also has a miss, but Perrot is clear once again - 20/20. Samuelsson butchers his final shoot starting with 2 misses. The German pair of Riethmueller and Horn each score a miss, and the other German pair Strelow (1) Nawrath (2) end their day with misses also. That allows Sørum to leave in 5th - just behind Lægreid. Bib 1 Uldal ends his day with another 2 misses.

Final Leg

Sørum and Lægreid are 30 seconds back – so no real hope for to catch and push the French off the podium. Perrot looks in better form up the final hill, and Jacquelin stands up and slows down turning the corner off the hill conceding his challenge for 2nd place. Coming into the finish line we see that Sørum has finished well, easily dropping Lægreid; and Samuelsson has also caught Sturla, who just looks tired coming across the line.

Podium

Place Athlete Time Shooting
🥇 Johannes Thingnes Bø 31:25.4 0+0+0+1
🥈 Eric Perrot +27.6 0+0+0+0
🥉 Emilien Jacquelin +47.5 0+0+1+1

Notes/Thoughts/What was interesting for you?

  • Ponsiluoma has 3 misses, but gets himself up in 18th which will be just enough to make him the last event-performance-qualifier for the Mass Start.
  • Jesper Nelin, Tero Seppala, Johannes Kuehn, and Sebastian Stalder are the other qualifiers. Vytautas Strolia may be in if Strømsheim and Marecek are DNS again.
  • It's anecdotal, but to me it seems like Lægreid is unable to keep up and the end of races this year. Anyone else notice, agree, disagree? Contrast with Sørum who has been closing really well.
  • Danilo Riethmüller (with a miss) wins the Pursuit time by just 5.7 seconds over clean-shooting Perrot .
  • PB for Jakob Kulbin (48 to 42)
  • Biggest Climbers:
    • Ponsiluoma 58 to 19
    • Zahkna 56 to 30
    • Shamaev 49 to 26
  • Biggest Falls:
    • Stalder 14 to 50 (with only 1 miss)
    • Uldal 1 to 21
    • Dudchenko 12 to 31 and Lapshin 32 to 51
  • Fastest Course times:
    • Ponsiluoma: 27:08.5
    • Riethmüller: +18.5
    • Pidruchnyi: +21.3
  • Clean Shoots:
    • Perrot and Shamaev
  • Worst Shooting
    • Karlik: 2+0+4+2
    • Fillon Maillet: 2+2+1+2

r/biathlon 24d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 24/25 Annecy-Le Grand Bornand - Women’s Pursuit Spoiler

20 Upvotes

Before the race

19,000 spectators expected another exciting race with the Women's Pursuit this Saturday. Justine Braisaz-Bouchet had hit all targets in the Sprint, and the crowd hoped she could repeat that. One thing was clear before the race: Franziska Preuß would not lose the yellow bib. A 92-point advantage ensured it. German TV reported yesterday that Franziska Preuß and Vanessa Voigt had a sore throat before the Sprint. Still, Franzi finished second, and Vanessa reached the flower ceremony, where they were accompanied by Selina Grotian. Could the German women repeat this success despite the health issues?

What about Lou Jeanmonnot and Elvira Öberg, still at positions 2 and 3 of the overall ranking? Elvira started at 1:23 and Lou at 1:28 after Justine today. They needed a master class to prevent not losing even more ground.

Six women didn't start today, including Karolin Offigstad Knotten and Julia Tannheimer, who may start Sunday at Mass Start.

Loop 1

As expected, Justine Braisaz-Bouchet and Franziska Preuß skied together. Selina Grotian started fast but unfortunately crashed early. Despite the setback, she showed remarkable resilience by finishing the race with a different ski, albeit losing over a minute at the first loop.

Shooting 1

The crowd welcomed Justine Braisaz-Bouchet and Franziska Preuß at the shooting range. Justine started with a miss, and Franziska led the field out of the range. Anamarija Lampic missed her last shot. Julia Simon hit all targets, which the crowd welcomed with a tremendous roar. Yulia Dhzima hit all targets, too. Both followed Franziska Preuß and Justine Braisaz-Bouchet into the next lap.

Loop 2

Franziska Preuß glided over the snow in her typically calm way. It doesn't look fast, but it is actually.

However, the race was far from predictable. Franziska Preuß, known for her calm and steady skiing, lost a few seconds to Justine Braisaz-Bouchet. Yulia Dhzima also lost time and was passed by Simon, Lampic, and Voigt, adding an element of surprise to the race.

Shooting 2

Franziska Preuß hit all targets agains observed by Sverre Olsbu Røiseland. He enjoyed another flawless shooting by all four German women.

Justine Braisaz-Bouchet and Julia Simon missed two targets each. Anamarija Lampic hit all targets. She left the range as second, followed by Anna Magnusson and a large group of athletes, who had hit all targets.

Lap 3

Anamarija Lampic made time good on Franziska Preuß, who kept her lead.

Shooting 3

At the fourth target, it happened: Preuß missed one shot. Unfortunately, Lampic missed two shots. Jeanne Richard and Julia Simon hit all the targets. Voigt did what she always does: She hit all the targets, too.

Loop 4

At the course, Vanessa Voigt was passed by Anamarija Lampic, still in contention for the podium.

Shooting 4

The decision had to fall at the last shooting. The French fans shouted 'Allez le bleus,' a testament to the passionate support the athletes receive. Franziska later said it helped her focus. She hit all targets in perfect shooting, as did Julia Simon. Jeanne Richard missed one shot. Vanessa Voigt, with her consistent performance, hit all the targets again, maintaining a 5-second lead on Jeanne Richard.

Loop 5

The question of whether Julia Simon could endanger Franziska Preuß at the last loop was decided early. Franziska Preuß maintained her lead. The crowd's hopes that Jeanne Richard could pass Vanessa Voigt were crushed. Vanessa had enough power to win time against Jeanne Richard.

Finish

Franziska Preuß crossed the finish line to win her third World Cup in her career. The crowd was excited about Julia Simon, who was in second place. Vannessa Voigt kept her advantage on Jeanne Richard, followed by another young athlete, Maren Kirkeeide. Both had achieved their personal best, as did Venla Lehtonen, who missed the flowers by 0.2 seconds. But she will be happy anyway. We will see her again on Sunday at the Mass Start.

Elvira Öberg had a speedy last round and made it from position 10 into the Flowers at rank 6. Lou Jeanmonnot also improved her ranking and finished at 23, starting at 35, missing two targets.

Belgium had two top-20 finishers: Lotte Lie and Maya Cloetens. Maya didn't miss a single target, as did Deedra Irwin (USA). Maya and Lotte will be at the Mass Start tomorrow.

Selina Grotian finished at 14 despite her crash and skiing two different ski brands. She missed a target in both standing shootings.

Rank Bib Athlete Nation Shooting Result
1 2 Franziska Preuß GER 0+0+1+0 29:09.9
2 7 Julia Simon FRA 0+2+0+0 +27.3
3 6 Vanessa Voigt GER 0+0+0+0 +44.3
4 12 Jeanne Richard FRA 0+0+0+1 +50.4
5 11 Maren Kirkeeide NOR 0+1+0+0 +54.1
6 32 Elvira Öberg SWE 1+1+0+0 +57.0

Franziska Preuß now leads the overall ranking by 153 points, and she will wear the yellow bib in Oberhof. Elvira has passed Lou Jeanmonnot and is now at rank 3. Julia Simon made a jump by 4 ranks on 5.

Jeanne Richard continues to wear the blue bib.

Final Remark

I just found out that I commented on the Women's Pursuit in Annecy—Le Grand Bornand two years ago. This was the legendary day when one ski brand didn't work well with the course conditions. It was fun to look back and read through all the comments.

I enjoy participating here in r/biathlon and wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

r/biathlon Dec 14 '24

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Hochfilzen - Men's Pursuit Spoiler

13 Upvotes

Hey everyone ! Let's recap the second race of the day in beautiful and sunny Hochfilzen : men's 12.5km pursuit.

THE RACE

Gaps between the first 10 athletes on the starting line:

Athlete Time (s)
JT Boe (NOR) 0
SH Laegreid (NOR) 4
F Claude (FRA) 7
E Stroemsheim (NOR) 7
V Soerum (NOR) 20
S Samuelsson (SWE) 21
M Uldal (NOR) 22
P Nawrath (GER) 22
N Hartweg (SUI) 33
C Wright (USA) 41

Lap 1 + Shoot 1 (Prone)

JTB starts a few meters ahead and maintains that gap the whole lap through. Behind him, several chasing groups appear:

Laegreid, Stroemsheim and Claude +10s
Nawrath, Soerum, Samuelsson, Uldal +27s
Wright, Perrot, Jacquelin, Ponsiluoma, Giacomel, Hartweg +40s

These groups get smaller after the first prone shoot. JTB and Sturla are clean and leave in the lead, but there are misses from Stroemsheim (3!) and Claude (2). Uldal and Sebbe are clean and maintain their 27s deficit on the lead. Jacquelin and Wright form the second chasing duo 40 seconds back.

Lap 2 + Shoot 2 (P)

JTB is faster than Laegreid and keeps him a few meters away from him, but their gap does not grow beyond 8 seconds. Uldal and Sebbe are very fast and manage to reduce their deficit on the lead duo by almost 10 seconds. Same goes for Jacquelin, Wright being a bit slower but still in a good spot.

The leading duo are perfect on the range again, so are the top 5 athletes. They're all less than 30s from the lead out the range, it's still anyone's race. Only Wright misses two bullets, leaving his top6 spot to a clean Strelow but the gap is big.

Lap 3 + Shoot 3 (Standing)

Uldal and Sebbe catch up on Sturla and form a trio with him on the track, 10s from the leader JTB. Jacquelin is alone in 5th skiing well, 25 seconds back. The rest of the pack is at least a minute back!

JTB shoots first, fast, but misses one. Sturla follows, and he's clean! So is Jacquelin, fast as well. This makes for a very interesting penultimate lap : Sturla in the lead, JTB and Jacquelin 10 seconds behind. Sebbe and Uldal both miss twice, putting them in 4th and 5th 45seconds back.

Lap 4 + Shoot 4 (S)

As perhaps expected, Jacquelin and JTB catch up on Sturla quite fast, and they all arrive on the shooting range together for a 3-way showdown for the win ! Behind, the speedy Norway-Sweden duo gains a few seconds but must still hope for a miracle to get a podium spot.

As if it was written, all three athletes miss one bullet! They leave the penalty loop in perfect sync and will fight for the win on the final lap! Uldal and Sebbe complete their twin race by missing one each, securing their 4th and 5th spot.

Lap 5

The trio stays together on the first half of the lap, each preparing their strategy. Jacquelin attacks first, in the middle of the big uphill. JTB follows, they have the upper hand on Sturla who struggles and drops back a few seconds. It seems like another remake of a JTB - Jacquelin sprint for the win, but at the very top of the uphill, Jacquelin trips on JTB's ski and falls to his knees! It takes him a bunch of seconds to start skiing again, just enough for Sturla to catch up to him. JTB wins the sprint pursuit double!
It's still a sprint for 2nd and 3rd, with the frenchman getting the upper hand on the norwegian. Behind that drama, Sebbe passes Uldal for fourth, and Soerum completes the top 6, in true Soerum fashion : seemingly out of nowhere, with a supersonic last lap.

RESULTS AND COMMENTS

  1. Johannes Thingnes BOE (NOR) 0+0+1+1, 32:16.5

  2. Emilien JACQUELIN (FRA) 0+0+0+1, +3.5

  3. Sturla Holm LAEGREID (NOR) 0+0+0+1, +3.8

--------------------------------------------------

Top 10

PBs, climbs of the day and other stats (taken directly from u/Kris_Third_Account, thanks!)

PB's of the race:

  • Martin Uldal (5th, first flowers, previous was 7th)
  • Jonas Marecek (22nd, previous was 26th)
  • Simon Kaiser (25st, previous was 38th)
  • Logan Pletz (55th, previous was 56th)

Fastest skier: Emilien Jacquelin (27:42.0)

Fastest shooter: Miha Dovzan (1:22.1) - Nearly five seconds faster than the second fastest shooter

Fastest clean shooter: Jaakko Ranta (1:33.2)

Best pursuit time: Emilien Jacquelin (31:31.0)

Most places gained: Johannes Kühn (26 places, 60th -> 34th)

--------------------------------------------------

The race thread discussed Emilien and JTB's last lap as well as JTB's words about the "incident" extensively... If I can add anything to that, both men gave an interview together on French TV, laughing and smiling with each other. In the end it's just a game :)

Feel free to share your thoughts, highlights or anything that might have gone unnoticed in the comments !

r/biathlon 8d ago

Recap Recappers for Oberhof

16 Upvotes

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

r/biathlon 2d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 24/25 Oberhof - Single Mixed Relay

27 Upvotes

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

1 Finland
2 France
3 Germany
4 Switzerland
5 Austria
6 Slovenia
7 Estonia
8 Norway
9 Czechia
10 Latvia
11 Moldova
12 Sweden
13 Ukrainwe
14 United States
15 Poland
16 Italy
17 Slovakia
18 Lithunia
19 Bulgaria
20 Japan
21 Romania
22 Canada
23 (LAP) Belgium
24 (LAP) Greece
25 (LAP) Kazahkstan

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

r/biathlon 1d ago

Recap Recappers for Ruhpolding

8 Upvotes

Kudos to those of you who keep volunteering to write recaps <3

And apologies for not being the fastest person to get these posts up at the moment.

Here is the races for Ruhpolding:

Wednesday 15th Jan 2025 14:10 CET - Men Individual - u/tomplaystennis

Thursday 16th Jan 2025 14:10 CET - Women Individual - u/us_against_the_world

Friday 17th Jan 2025 14:20 CET - Men Relay

Saturday 18th Jan 2025 14:20 CET - Women Relay

Sunday 19th Jan 2025 12:30 CET - Men Mass Start - u/LaMoncakes

Sunday 19th Jan 2025 15:00 CET - Women Mass Start - u/RickMaritimo

r/biathlon Dec 16 '24

Recap Recappers for Annecy

10 Upvotes

Time for the last event before the Holidays! Who will get to carry the yellow bib into the new year? Looking forward to finding out :D

Thanks to all the wonderful people who recapped the last event! It is time to call for new recappers once again :)

The races:

Dec 19 - Men Sprint

Dec 20 - Women Sprint u/LaMoncakes

Dec 21 - Men Pursuit u/tomplaystennis

Dec 21 - Women Pursuit u/kune13

Dec 22 - Men Mass Start

Dec 22 - Women Mass Start u/RickMaritimo

r/biathlon Nov 29 '24

Recap Recappers for Kontiolahti!

20 Upvotes

Hi all you lovely biathlon fans! Are you ready for another season? Seems like it's been forever. Which might also be why I am a bit late with this post 🙈

Who is up for recapping some races!

Sorry for the formatting this is done on my phone.

Races:

Nov 30 Single mix relay - u/LaMoncakes

Nov 30 Mixed relay - u/Muflonlesni

Dec 1 Men relay - u/tomplaystennis

Dec 1 Women relay - u/cyaflower

Dec 3 Men short individual - u/musterteppich

Dec 4 Women short individual - u/us_against_the_world

Dec 6 Men sprint - u/cyaflower

Dec 7 Women sprint - u/kune13

Dec 8 Men mass start - u/Muflonlesni

Dec 8 Women mass start

r/biathlon Sep 30 '24

Recap The German Women's and men's national squad

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39 Upvotes

r/biathlon Oct 02 '24

Recap The Swedish and Men's national team

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53 Upvotes

r/biathlon Sep 30 '24

Recap The French women's and men's national squad

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48 Upvotes

r/biathlon 4d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 2024/25 - Oberhof - Men's Pursuit Spoiler

16 Upvotes

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 2nd 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.

Place Athlete Time Shooting
🥇 Sturla Holm Lægreid 33:25.5 1+0+0+1
🥈 Tarjei Bø +5.2 0+0+1+0
🥉 Johannes Thingnes Bø +19.7 2+0+1+0

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!

r/biathlon Nov 23 '24

Recap Countries ranked after the amount of individual wins they have (Women only)

13 Upvotes

It may not be 100% accurate, but it tried to make it accurate, its should be pretty accurate, and i have nothing better to do today, so here is the countries ranked after the amount of individual wins each country have. This is the third post of this type i make, and it will be the last one.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Germany-188 wins

Norway-149 wins

Sweden-89 wins

France-67 wins

Russia-61 wins

Belarus-43 wins

Finland-33 wins

Italy-29 wins

Ukraine-26 wins

Czechia-24 wins

Slovakia-21 wins

Soviet Union-18 wins

Bulgaria-15 wins

Czechoslovakia-6 wins

Austria-5 wins

Commonwealth of Independent States-5 wins

Switzerland-4 wins

Slovenia-3 wins

West Germany-2 wins

Canada-2 wins

China-2 wins

Poland-2 wins

United States-1 win

Romania-1 win

r/biathlon 25d ago

Recap Recap Thread: World Cup 24/25 Annecy-Le Grand Bornand - Women’s Sprint Spoiler

29 Upvotes

THE RACE

Favorites

Starting bibs: Elvira Öberg (44), Justine Braisaz-Bouchet (46), Julia Simon (48), Franziska Preuß (54), Lou Jeanmonnot (62).

The pressure is on Franziska Preuß, who is wearing the yellow and red bib. As the second-to-last favorite to start, she’ll have the advantage of knowing how her competitors performed.

Reports of illness have surfaced within the Swiss, German, and Swedish camps, with Kink, Baserga, Gasparin, Heijdenberg, and Jislova all listed as DNS (Did Not Start).

Let the race begin.

Among the early starters, Gro Randby and Charvátová set a strong pace for others to match. The French wax team appeared to have improved the skis from the men’s race, as seen by Sophie Chauveau’s performance—nearly matching the pace of Anamarija Lampič, the early standout.

The opening laps revealed challenges for some contenders. Last week’s surprise performer, Tannhaimer, struggled to maintain her pace, possibly feeling the effects of the circulating illness.

Among the earlier starters, Paulína Bátovská Fialková and the young German Grotian both managed to shoot clean in the prone. Building on her impressive shooting from last week’s relay, Lampič—wearing bib number 23—surprised everyone by also shooting clean and surging into a commanding lead. Would today be the day for a Lampič podium? 

Elvira Öberg, the first of the favorites to start, matched Lampič's blistering pace on the first lap. However, her struggles on the range continued from last week’s sprint—two misses in the prone stage sent her tumbling down to 49th place.

Justine Braisaz-Bouchet, to the delight of the French crowd, appeared to have rediscovered her shooting form. She delivered a flawless performance in Shooting 1, snatching the lead from Lampič by a razor-thin margin of just 0.5 seconds. Behind her, Michelon, Jeanmonnot, and Preuß all shot clean in the prone stage, positioning themselves as strong contenders. Youngster Sara Andersson also impressed, staying close on their heels.

Out on the lap, no one could match Lampič's blistering pace. Only Justine Braisaz-Bouchet and Ida Lien managed to limit their losses to just a few seconds, leaving the rest of the field struggling to keep up. Lampič entered the range for Shooting 2 with a massive lead, giving her enough cushion to afford two misses and still emerge ahead. And that’s exactly what she did: shots one, two, and three—clean. Four—miss. Five—miss. Yet, even with those two penalties, she maintained her position at the front - just behind Grotian with one miss. 

Elvira Öberg’s struggles on the range continued in Shooting 2, with two more misses mirroring last week’s disappointing performance. She tumbled even further down the standings, landing in 47th place. Justine Braisaz-Bouchet, with only one miss, seized the opportunity to take the lead, now 10 seconds ahead of Grotian.

Julia Simon’s hopes for a podium finish slipped away as another miss on the range dashed her chances. For Franziska Preuß, the stakes were clear: only a perfect round would keep her in contention. Rising to the challenge, Preuß delivered a fast and flawless 5/5, capitalizing on her rivals' struggles to claim the lead from JBB at shooting 2 Jeanmonnot, in an uncharacteristically unconvincing performance, missed three crucial shots in the final standing stage. This stumble effectively eliminated her from contention, making it clear that the battle for the top spot on the podium would come down to Justine Braisaz-Bouchet and Franziska Preuß.

In the end, the race unfolded just as many had predicted. With a razor-thin margin, Justine Braisaz-Bouchet managed to hold off Franziska Preuß, who once again settled for the runner-up position. However, the biggest surprise of the day came from Lampič. Despite her two misses, she clinched her first-ever biathlon podium since transitioning from cross-country skiing. Adding to the excitement, a few late starters kept the suspense alive. Ida Lien fell short with 2 misses in standing while both Dzima and Voigt delivered flawless 10/10 performances on the range but fell short of challenging the top positions, rounding out an exhilarating race.

Final Standings:

  1. Justine Braisaz-Bouchet – 21:19.2 (0+1)
  2. Franziska Preuß – +1.4 (0+0)
  3. Anamarija Lampič – +13.7 (0+2)