Golden double of Russians in relay races, Loginov’s triumph and Fourcade’s discontent: results of the World Cup stage in Oberhof

The fourth stage of the Biathlon World Cup finished in Oberhof, Germany. For the first time in 13 years, the women's and men's national teams of Russia won synchronous victories in the relay races. Alexander Loginov won the sprint race and won the first gold medal at competitions of this level. Martin Fourcade expressed dissatisfaction with the success of the athlete and said he did not respect him.

Hero

Alexander Loginov went all through December to overtake Johannes Be, and did it in January in Oberhof. The Russian already at the first stages showed that he was able to fight for the highest places, but in Germany he was head and shoulders stronger than all his rivals.

In the sprint, a native of Saratov not only accurately shot, but also demonstrated an excellent course. Faster than him this evening was only Be-junior. However, the Norwegian, unlike the Russians, made a slip on the rack and as a result remained the second.

The seven-time World Cup winner Martin Fourcade, who is in trouble this season, was unable to compete with Loginov. The Frenchman with a slip gave Alexadra about 50 seconds and ended up left without medals.

Loginov not only won the first personal race within the framework of the CM in his career, but also became the first Russian biathlete in ten months, who managed to climb the top step of the pedestal. And he did it twice, adding gold in the relay to the sprint victory.

In the pursuit, the new team leader was only fifth, unable to cope with the shooting, but thanks to this result, the Russian strengthened his position in the overall World Cup. He is now ranked second.

Heroine

In women, the main star of the stage without a doubt was Lisa Vitozzi. The 23-year-old Italian loudly declared herself last season, having won several medals in the KM races. In December, she was several times near the podium and almost always finished in the top ten. These results allowed Vitozzi to rise in the top three overall leaders.

Success, as in the case of Loginov, came to Liza immediately after the New Year. In the sprint, the Italian won the first victory in the KM in her career, ahead of Anais Chevalier and Hannu Oberg. In pursuit, Vitozzi retained the first line, having allowed only two misses in strong wind conditions.

The “Golden Double” allowed the Italian to rise to second place in the total, and now she is only 42 points behind the eminent compatriot Dorothea Wierer, who performed much less successfully in Oberhof.

Lisa Vittozzi
globallookpress.com
© opokupix

Success

But the main "golden double" of the stage was formed in the relay races by Russian biathletes. Domestic fours managed to celebrate confident victories, although nobody expected this from them. Thus, three biathletes at once entered the women's quartet, which debuted at the CM only in the current season. And for Larisa Kuklina the relay race in Oberhof in general became the first race in her career in the World Cup.

An experienced athlete was selected to the main team through the "Izhevsk rifle", but did not get into the application for the sprint. It seemed that the coaches were preparing her for the stage in Ruhpolding, but in the end, the national team decided otherwise and immediately put Kuklin on the baton. As a result, Larissa did not disappoint and worked to zero.

The other participants of the relay coped, in contrast to the rivals, who regularly made mistakes in unfavorable weather conditions. As a result, Russians sensationally finished with a flag with a 30-second margin from the second German women.

A few hours later, the men repeated their achievement, and the Russian four, consisting of Maxim Tsvetkov, Evgeny Garanichev, Dmitry Malyshko and Alexander Loginov, secured a minute break at the finish.

All domestic biathletes confidently worked through their stages, including Garanichev, who had previously experienced psychological problems in relay races and regularly made fateful mistakes. This time, Eugene closed all 10 targets and led the Russian team to the top. Then another experienced athlete and Olympic champion Malyshko widened the gap to a minute. Well, Loginov had just not to lose a colossal gap.

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Disappointment

The victory of Loginov left no one indifferent, including foreign biathletes. Many of them were not happy about the success of the Russians and began to recall his doping past. In particular, Martin Fourcade called Alexander's victory a “disgrace” and noted that he did not respect him. Loginov, in response, promised to talk to the Frenchman face to face.

Joined Fourcade and Swede Sebastian Samuelsson, who is regularly marked by remarks about the Russian athlete. This time he said that he was waiting for a public apology from the opponent. True, at the award ceremony, the Scandinavians did not make any claims to Alexander personally, without giving up the handshake.

Return

As part of the gold relay fours, I wanted to rejoice for each biathlete, but especially the fans were touched by the success of Maxim Tsvetkov. The ex-captain of the Russian national team in the fall was not in the best shape and could not get into the team through special control starts. The world champion did not look impressive even at the stages of the Russian Cup. However, in January, Tsvetkov, like Kuklin, selected himself for the first team through the Izhevsk rifle and came to Oberhof.

Sprint showed that Maxim is still not ready to speak at the World Cup. With three misses, the 27-year-old biathlete took only 56th place and struggled to reach the pursuit. But there Tsvetkov managed to correct - he played 33 lines at once. And the coaches were so impressed with the performance of the athlete that they included him in the relay four, and in the responsible role of the driver

Flowers did not disappoint here. Demonstrating perfect shooting, he helped the Russian men's team win their first victory in the QM relay in three years.

Maxim Tsvetkov
RIA News
© Denis Kostyuchenko

Antihero

But the main anti-hero of the stage again became Kaisa Mäkäräinen. After a successful start of the season in Pokljuka and Hochfilzen, the experienced Finnish woman frankly failed both in Nove Mesto and Oberhof, and on January 11, the athlete celebrated her 36th birthday between the sprint and the pursuit race on the day of rest. She met him clearly not in the best mood, because only the 44th finished in the sprint with an inexplicable three misses at the first shooting range.

In the pasyute, Mäkäräinen managed to correct his position a bit and climbed to 22nd place, but this did not help Kaise much in the struggle for the Great Crystal Globe. In total, the current winner of the trophy has already dropped to eighth place and even Belarusian Irina Krivko missed ahead.

Cunning

In the men's pursuit race before the final firing line, a real show took place. According to NRK, Norway’s coaches, Siegfried Maze and Egil Kristiansen, deliberately deceived Fourcade to help get ahead of Be.

It is reported that Johannes was given a false installation to shoot from the first shield. Hearing this, the Frenchman hurried to take him. As a result, Marten not only beat the pulse, overtaking his quick rival before the final frontier, but also actually closed his rival from the wind.

At the turn of Johannes made one mistake and ran to another victory, and Martin missed two and was left without medals. Norwegians tactics condemned eight-time Olympic champion Ole Einar Bjoerndalen.

“Tactics in biathlon has always been. But I have never come across a coach trying to provoke someone. I don't like it all. I think this is a provocation that contradicts the principles of sport. Of course, you need to put maximum effort to win, but this is not consistent with the principles of wrestling, ”Björndalen NRK quotes.

Kaisa Myakyaryinen
globallookpress.com
© opokupix

Slips

The stage in Oberhof is traditionally difficult for biathletes in terms of shooting, since there is often a strong wind blowing and snowing. This year the weather was especially capricious, and practically everyone made mistakes on the frontiers. But, perhaps, the worst shooting was shown by Italian Nicole Gontier in the relay. At the front, she managed to prevent eight mistakes at once and went to five penalties. After this, the four of the contender has no chance of a podium.

Numeral

For 13 years, the Russian men's and women's four could not arrange the “golden double” in the races at the World Cup stage. The last time such success was submitted to the team in 2006 in Hochfilzen. Then domestic athletes left their rivals behind and won two sets of gold medals at once.

Sentence

Meanwhile, for Pavlova, the stage in Oberhof was doubly memorable. Firstly, she helped the Russian team win the relay, and secondly, she agreed to the offer of a hand and heart from her young man, and she did it right on the eve of the team race.

"I said yes"! For some reason, I wanted to do it now, even though two weeks have already passed, ”Pavlova wrote on Instagram.

The name of the chosen athlete is not reported, as well as the date of the upcoming wedding. Evgenia herself noted that she would be ready to discuss this topic a bit later.

Quote

If many foreign athletes, after the victory of Loginov in the sprint, criticized him, then Bjoerndalen, on the contrary, called for an end to the persecution of the Russians.

“He served his punishment for doping; you need to respectfully relate to the fact that after that Alexander did return. But some people reacted negatively to his victory. We can say that many people didn’t like this result in the biathlon environment, ”Björndalen TV 2 quotes.