Canmore, Canada IBU World Cup 4 x 7.5 k/ 4 x 6 k relay Friday in Canmore was team relay day. Norway’s Lars Helge Birkeland, Vetle Sjåstad Christiansen, Erlend Øvereng Bjøntegaard and Johannes Thingnes Bø won the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay in 1:16:36.6 hours while acquiring no penalties on the shooting range and using seven spares. In second place was France’s Antonin Guigonnat, Emilien Jacquelin, Simon Fourcade, and Quentin Fillon Maillet. The French...
FIS World Cup Dresden, Germany 6 x 1.6 k Freestyle Team Sprint The first World Cup team sprint of the season was run amidst drizzle and the Dresden, Germany city-scape as the women raced a total of six 1.6-kilometer laps. Round and round on the looping course, the pace was a mix of tactically subdued speeds with sustained bursts of energy to break the pack. After all the speed changes and exchanges with one athlete...
IBU World Cup Nové Město, Czech Republic Mass Starts Sunday’s mass start races wrapped up the first stretch of IBU World Cup race calendar. And with it, on the men’s side, Johannes Thingnes Bø of Norway has dominated the win column. Sunday marked his sixth victory of the season as he won the 15-kilometer mass start race in Nové Město, Czech Republic in a time of 37:25.2 minutes. Bø shot clean on Sunday as he...
IBU Open European Championships (Ridnaun-Val Ridanna, Italy): Single mixed & mixed relays Susan Dunklee and Lowell Bailey teamed up for the final day of the 2018 International Biathlon Union (IBU) Open European Championships in Ridnaun, Italy, and raced to a bronze medal in the single mixed relay. The American duo, both of which earned individual medals at last year’s IBU World Championships, finished just 9.1 seconds out of first, which went to Norway’s Thelka Brun-Lie...
FIS Nordic Combined World Cup (Seefeld, Austria): Normal hill/10 k Two of the same men from Jumping | Women’s report Women’s final Men’s qualifier | Friday’s sprint and thus started first), and shot clean to take the lead after the third stage — where Varvynets missed one. Chevalier went on to clean the final stage for perfect 20-for-20 shooting and crossed the line first in 29:25.4. Varvynets finished second, 11.0 seconds back after missing a...
FIS Nordic World Championships (Lahti, Finland): Women’s 30 k freestyle mass start Marit Bjørgen made it a four-peat on Saturday with her fourth gold and third individual win over the last week at 2017 Nordic World Championships in Lahti, Finland. (She previously won the 15-kilometer skiathlon, 10 k classic, and 4 x 5 k relay.) The 36-year-old Norwegian closed out the championships with a 1.9-second victory in the women’s 30-kilometer freestyle mass start, finishing in 1:08:36.8...
FIS Cross-Country World Cup (Falun, Sweden): 15 / 30 k classic mass start Men’s report In the women’s 15-kilometer classic mass start on Sunday, Norway swept the podium with Marit Bjørgen taking the win in a time of 41:28.8 in Falun, Sweden. Crossing just half a second behind her was her teammate, Ingvild Flugstad Østberg in second place. Rounding out the podium was Heidi Weng in third (+8.1). American Jessie Diggins was the first to cross the line...
FIS Cross-Country World Cup (Falun, Sweden): Men’s & women’s freestyle sprints Men’s report [UPDATED] Kikkan Randall reached the final for the first time since March 2015 on Saturday in the women’s 1.4-kilometer freestyle sprint at the World Cup in Falun, Sweden. The American qualified 26th and went on to advance in second out of her quarterfinal and semifinal to reach the six-woman final, where she ended up fifth. Sweden’s Stina Nilsson won the final by one-hundredth of...
For Germany and Norway, it was a two-way battle for first following the final exchange of the men’s 4 x 7.5-kilometer relay on Saturday at the International Biathlon Union (IBU) World Cup in Antholz, Italy. There, thanks to third-leg Johannes Thingnes Bø, Norway had taken the lead by 17.7 seconds over Germany and built a 38-second gap to Russia in third. Ukraine was another nine seconds back in fourth, skiing just ahead of France and...
U.S. SuperTour (Truckee, Calif.): Classic sprints [UPDATED] Less than a week after being men’s 30 k classic mass start champion at this year’s U.S. nationals — won Saturday’s SuperTour classic sprint as well. Lustgarten, of the Craftsbury Green Racing Project, raced to a 1.58-second victory in the men’s A-final at the Auburn Ski Club in Soda Springs, Calif., finishing in 3:03.4. Ben Saxton, of the Stratton Mountain School (SMS) Elite Team, placed second, and Reese...
As Lowell Bailey rounded the course on Saturday in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic, a total of five times in the men’s 12.5-kilometer pursuit, he couldn’t hear a thing his coaches were shouting at him. The 35,000 spectators in the stadium and lining the track were overpowering them, but their movements gave the US Biathlon veteran all the information he needed to know. “It was, by far, the loudest spectator crowd I’ve ever experienced,” Bailey recalled on...
In "danger" of not qualifying for 2016 World Championships, Germany’s Erik Lesser stuck it to those who questioned his chances, winning Saturday's mass start at the IBU World Cup in Ruhpolding in front of a local crowd. "I don’t want to hear about that again after giving you what you wanted," he told reporters.
Martin Fourcade didn't feel very good this weekend -- he made that well known -- yet the Frenchman pushed on for his 41st World Cup victory in Sunday's 15 k mass start at the IBU World Cup in Ruhpolding, Germany. American Lowell Bailey finished 16th and Canadian Nathan Smith took 25th in the selective race.
Germany's Simon Schempp won the second race of the week at the IBU World Cup in Pokljuka, Slovenia, with a 16-second pursuit victory over France's Martin Fourcade, while American Tim Burke raced up to ninth (after starting 14th) for his first top 10 of the season.
Germany's Simon Schempp won his second-straight sprint at the third stop of the IBU World Cup in Pokljuka, Slovenia. Meanwhile, Lowell Bailey was one of nine men in the top 15 to clean, and his U.S. teammate Tim Burke finished just ahead of him in 14th.
Nathan Smith shot 19-for-20 for the first time in a 20 k individual race to place 12th on Thursday, and Leif Nordgren did the same to finish 20th, which stood as career-best 20 k results for both. France's Martin Fourcade won the race with perfect shooting, and the top-three men all cleaned.
Brendan Green couldn't say for sure what's brought him so much success lately -- could be the venues or the minor cues he's been working on -- but his coaches have a hunch. The Canadian biathlete became the first man on the circuit in the last two seasons to shoot 50-for-50 in four-straight IBU World Cup races.
All the news that's fit to print from the last World Cup sprints of the season, where Darya Domracheva of Belarus and Jakov Fak of Slovenia took home wins.
Martin Fourcade used his blazing ski speed to win his second biathlon gold of the Games. But silver medalist Erik Lesser did something more personal: he repaid his grandfather Axel, a cross-country skier, who was in second place in the 1976 Olympics before colliding with a spectator and withdrawing from the race. Evgeniy Garanichev of Russia, meanwhile, became the first athlete to win a medal on their birthday when he took bronze.
The Russian men continued their exceptional weekend in Oberhof, with Dmitry Malyshko shooting perfectly and winning the pursuit unchallenged. Evgeniy Garanichev made up for his singly penalty and placed second, repeating his own finish from the sprint.