Selection trials for Biathlon Canada began with a men’s and women’s sprint today in Canmore, Canada. Race results will help determine athletes representing Canada on the IBU World Cup’s opening races, and the first series of races on the IBU Cup and Junior IBU Cup.
Prior to Tuesday’s racing, only Scott Gow and Rosanna Crawford had prequalified for Canada’s IBU World Cup team based on a top-16 result last season.
Senior National Team member Megan Bankes won the overall women’s 7.5-kilometer sprint in a time of 21:43.2 minutes. Bankes missed one shot shooting prone and cleaned standing. Bankes’ teammate on the National Team, Megan Tandy, placed second (+22.8). Tandy cleaned her prone stage while missing one standing. Pre-qualified athlete Crawford took third (+52.4) while cleaning prone and missing two shots standing.
Women were penalized 24 seconds per miss due to insufficient snow for a penalty loop.
Christian Gow, a member of the Senior National Team won the overall men’s 10 k sprint in 24:39.5 minutes. He had no missed shots on the day. Older brother Scott Gow raced to second place (+47.9) while missing two shots, one prone one standing. Taking third place was U24 National Development Team member Jules Burnotte. Burnotte finished in 25:31.1 minutes and had two misses: one each in prone and standing.
With the course lacking a penalty loop, the men were penalized 22 seconds per miss.
Selection trials resume on Thursday with another sprint race.
Jason Albert
Jason lives in Bend, Ore., and can often be seen chasing his two boys around town. He’s a self-proclaimed audio geek. That all started back in the early 1990s when he convinced a naive public radio editor he should report a story from Alaska’s, Ruth Gorge. Now, Jason’s common companion is his field-recording gear.
