Translated material
Bronze sprint
The Russians won two awards in Khanty-Mansiysk
The eighth stage of the Biathlon World Cup started in Khanty-Mansiysk with two sprint races, where the Russians won two bronze medals. Andrey Makoveev completed the top three, almost 32 seconds behind the winner, Norwegian Ole Einar Bjoerndalen. The second bronze medal was earned by Albina Akhatova, who lost to the top German Magdalena Neuner by 16 seconds.This year, Khanty-Mansiysk was entrusted with hosting not the last, which usually does not decide anything, but the penultimate cup stage, where the vicissitudes of the struggle for champion places in the general and individual classifications promised continuation of the intrigue. However, the start of the “home” start confirmed the conclusion lying on the surface: after the World Championships in Ostersund, our athletes, for various reasons, are in decline, and this is not turning into the results that could be expected.
The geography of the World Cup stages after the world championship seemed to test the athletes' strength. A week after the end of the world championship in Sweden, the biathletes had to move to the Korean city of Pyeongchang, and from there to Russia, to Khanty-Mansiysk. It is clear that long flights, time zone changes and problems with acclimatization did not add strength and health. The consequence of this was a tangible “loss” in the Russian team. 2008 world champion and medalist Maxim Chudov, having caught a cold in Korea, ended the current season ahead of schedule.
The President of the Russian Biathlon Union, Alexander Tikhonov, was against the leaders of the Russian team competing in Korea. I believed that none of the Russians was a contender for the role of leader at the end of the season, and no one was interested in the vice-champion title. In addition, a grueling trip to Korea, associated with the long flights within Russia that preceded it, will bleed the already exhausted team. However, the national team coaches did not agree with the point of view of the head of the RBU.
Meanwhile, the legendary Norwegian leader of this season, Ole Einar Bjoerndalen, missed the Korean stage, citing a viral infection. But we can assume that this was a pre-planned move. As a result, Bjoerndalen won the sprint in Khanty-Mansiysk without any difficulties. He calmly walked the entire 10 km distance and was accurate in shooting. A two-week vacation allowed the experienced Norwegian to stay in good shape and in this race beat his 22-year-old teammate Emily Egle Svendsen, who also shot clean. Svendsen has performed very well this season. He performed well at the World Championships and at the next stage in Korea. Apparently, the athlete’s age and motivation played a decisive role in this. On a wave of success, Svendsen continues to win prizes.
With yesterday's victory, Bjoerndalen cleared up all questions regarding the situation in the overall World Cup standings. He is separated from his closest pursuer, Russian Dmitry Yaroshenko, by 159 points. In addition, this season Bjoerndalen is quite capable of reaching another record held by the Swedish alpine skier Ingemar Stenmark. During his sports career, the Swede has won 86 World Cup stages, the Norwegian currently has 81, but Bjoerndalen still has five races left.
Of the eight Russians who started yesterday, only one, Alexei Churin, shot clean. All the others, including bronze medalist Andrei Makoveev, were inaccurate. Makoveev explained his only mistake by excitement. His relatives were present at the stadium, which imposed an additional psychological burden. Andrey Prokurin and Nikolai Kruglov made the most mistakes - four each. By the way, Kruglov purposefully prepared for the stage in Khanty-Mansiysk and did not fly to Pyeongchang. If not for poor shooting, the Russian would have finished closer than the sixth place he eventually took, since he was faster than everyone else in this race.
Another bronze medal was earned yesterday by the experienced Albina Akhatova, who was impeccable in shooting and only lost in speed to the German Neuner and the French Sandine Bailey. By the way, unlike Ekaterina Yuryeva, who was resting, Akhatova competed in Korea and earned our team’s only bronze medal. It seems that this season the surge in Akhatova’s results was largely contributed by two factors - a long break associated with the birth of her son, during which the athlete, according to her, missed biathlon, and serious motivation, also associated with the birth of a child.
As for the rest of the Russians, most likely Yuryeva, who performed successfully in Sweden, did not so much rest during the missed week as reap the benefits of her victories. With two misses, Yuryeva closed the top ten participants in the sprint race, which, in addition to Akhatova, also included Olga Anisimova, who became eighth. The remaining five Russian biathletes ranked even further down in the final protocol.