E.ON IBU World Cup Biathlon

The second day of competition ended with the women’s pursuit that granted many bright emotions to the biathlon fans.

Let me start by saying that the winner of the sprint and one of the most popular biathletes Magdalena Neuner did not take the advantage of a comfortable starting position and could not get on the podium. Five misses in the three shootings were the reason for that. The extra 750 meters of penalty distance exhausted the biathlete, known for her speed and endurance and she almost didn’t run the finishing section of the track. But the beginning was quite different…

The leaders of the race Magdalena Neuner of Germany, Vita Semerenko of Ukraine, Darya Domracheva of Belarus and Kaisa Mäkäräinen of Finland, using their solid lead, held the shootings simultaneously. The position of the leader in this group was constantly passed from one biathlete to another depending on the shooting results. In the end of the race the clear favorite Neuner exhausted her supplies of powers at the penalty loops, and she even missed twice in the second shooting. Also, a Vita Semerenko’s miss allowed Domracheva and Mäkäräinen to catch up. Thus, the Belarusian biathlete got more than a 20-second lead and could even increase the gap till the finish. After her came the winner of a silver medal in Pursuit Kaisa Mäkäräinen, being 24.8 seconds behind the leader and the winner of a bronze medal Vita Semerenko, being 32.1 seconds behind the leader.

To the delight of the residents, who followed the course of the race from the stands of the Winter Sports Center named after A. Filipenko and TV screens, Svetlana Sleptsova born in Khanty-Mansiysk today was the best in the Russian team. By the way she ran and shot it could be seen that the local biathlete was serious. She pushed herself to the limit not only at the track, but at the shooting range as well. As a result, she was able to rise from the 31th starting position to the 17th position in the start list. Moreover, it seemed that she could cope with the nerves and made only one miss. The remaining Russian biathletes were placed between 24th and 37th  positions.