| The Poiret couple monopolized the “gold” of the world championship The Biathlon World Championships ended yesterday in Oberhof (Germany) with the victory of Frenchman Raphael Poiret in the 15 km mass start race. The day before, his wife, Norwegian Liv Gret Poiret, excelled in a similar discipline, where the distance was 2.5 km shorter. The entire struggle for victory in the team competition between the French and Norwegian teams essentially came down to a family competition between the Poiret couple. Liv Gret won one more top award than her husband, which determined the result of the overall classification. In total, the international duo added nine medals to the family treasury, of which seven were gold. It’s time for Rafael and his wife to perform as a separate team! Sergei Konovalov, who finished third in the mass start, pleased the Russian fans on Sunday. This is the only medal for the men's half of the Russian team at this championship.
On Friday morning, unpleasant news arrived at the Norwegian delegation in Oberhof. The mother of four-time Olympic champion Ole Einar Bjoerndalen died after a serious illness. The coaches decided not to tell the athlete about the loss before the start of the relay, telling him the sad news only at the finish line. As expected, the Germans were out of competition in the 4x7.5 km race. At the first stage, Frank Lück ran for them, announcing the end of his sports career. The veteran's teammates saw him off with dignity, allowing him to finish his active performances on a positive note. Bjoerndalen and his comrades showed the second result, the French came third in the relay. The Russian team could have gotten a place on the podium, but Nikolai Kruglov was a great let down. He was late to enter the corridor where the relay change was taking place due to his carelessness. Nikolai could not get his boot into the fastenings, because dense snow and small stones were stuck in this place, which had to be picked out with a screwdriver.
The streak of bad luck for our team continued on Saturday. Svetlana Ishmuratova entered the mass start with a great emotional mood; she was predicted to have a high result, but all the cards were confused by a fatal collapse on the first descent. One after another, the athletes began to fall on a steep slope, where the speed along the track reaches 70 km/h. Some managed to get around the losers, others touched those lying on the snow and lost their balance. So Svetlana was hit hard, she almost fell into a ditch, quickly got up and appeared at the first firing line among the last, but ready to fight further. Alas, the whole trouble of falling in biathlon is not the loss of a few seconds, but the fact that the rifle’s sights are lost. Ishmuratova never hit a single target and realized that it was pointless to continue the race.
Another victory for Liv Gret Poiret seemed obvious already in the first half of the distance. Even having missed twice during her third run at the shooting range, the Norwegian took penalty loops without feeling the hot breath of her pursuers.
Since the Russian women had the maximum representation in the mass start - six shooting skiers, head coach Valery Palkhovsky planned to use team wrestling tactics in this personal discipline. Its main purpose is to bring one of the girls together to a medal, slowing down the most dangerous rivals on the track. Alas, during the race, the five remaining Russian women had no time for the plans of the coaching staff. Only Anna Bogaliy and Olga Pyleva did not stay in the top ten for long, and the gap between the Russians in terms of distance was too large. Poiret safely rolled to the finish line with the national flag in her hands, after a minute and a half, German Simone Denkinger crossed the line, and Frenchwoman Sandrine Bailey took bronze. The best result among our team was shown by Natalya Guseva - seventh place.
On Sunday night, Bjoerndalen, having called his relatives, made the courageous decision to stay at the championship and run the mass start. In the middle of the race, Ole Einar and Poiret were leading in tandem; at the third shooting stage they simultaneously misfired and simultaneously went into penalty loops. Then the Frenchman turned on the extra speed, began to pull away from his opponent, and Bjoerndalen lost pace. An inaccurate shot at the fourth firing line left him without a reward; Lars Berger made up for the Norwegian leader, who raced through the final segment with courier speed. About five riders fought among themselves for bronze, and Konovalov did not make a mistake here. The 30-year-old Russian retained more strength, ahead of Bjoerndalen, the Pole Sikora, and the Norwegian Hanevold. Sergei’s “bronze” slightly smoothed out the generally rather colorless performance of our men’s team.
World Championship medal table W S B Total | Norway | 4 | 2 | 3 | 9 | | France | 3 | 1 | 2 | 6 | | Germany | 2 | 3 | 2 | 7 | | Russia | 1 | 3 | 2 | 6 | | Poland | - | 1 | - | 1 | | Belarus | - | - | 1 | 1 | | Ukraine | - | - | 1 | 1 |
Ilya TRISVIATSKY
|
