“I ran with the thought of bringing as little as possible”: Tomshin about debut in the national team, a penalty in the relay and shooting in one breath

- Commenting on your performance for Russian television, you joked that you did everything in your power to give the relay race maximum interest.

And so that those who will start after you are not bored.

But seriously speaking, for a newcomer to the team, any such mistake can be the last: you can fly out of the base even for less sins than the penalty loop in the relay.

Thinking about it?

- It is customary for Russian athletes to feel a sense of unsteadiness under their feet.

It seems to me that everyone goes through this state, but you quickly get used to it.

There are no such thoughts that you can run it wrong - and that's it, life is over.

Therefore, even after the penalty loop happened, I ran with only one thought: to bring as little backlog as possible to the guys.

- You shot off the bench somehow quite swiftly.

- I did not try to accelerate specifically.

I understood that this is not the case when you can afford to take risks.

- The senior coach of your team, Yuri Kaminsky, said in relation to your shooting that it was very tactically correct, since the Norwegian Sturla Legraid, at the same time with whom you were shooting while prone, really does not like it when someone leaves the line in front of him.

Does it make a difference for you which of the foreigners to spar with on the track or to be shoulder to shoulder on the shooting range?

- In Östersund at the second stage of the World Cup, when I arrived there, I had a very strange feeling in the first two days of training.

I drove into the stadium, and around only those whom I had previously seen only on TV.

It was an interesting sensation.

It's over now.

In the race, all the more I do not pay attention to who is running nearby, who is shooting.

- Do you really not want to twist your head around, peep something from someone, learn something?

- Unfortunately, our schedule is not very convenient in this regard: we moved from Ostersund to Hochfilzen, skated for two days, on the third the starts had already begun.

Three days, three performances.

There is no time to study here - you focus only on doing what you have to do yourself, so you don’t look around at all.

If there was an opportunity to spend at least a week of joint training in such a company, it would be really great to take a closer look at everyone.

- When did the coaches announce that you will start in the relay?

- The desire to run the relay race appeared as soon as I arrived in Östersund.

But there the first stage was run by Karim Khalili.

In Hochfilzen, literally half an hour after the pursuit, one of our coaches came up to me and said that I was in the squad.

- Considering that in the pursuit on Saturday you started 47th and finished tenth, the decision to entrust you with the starting stage is quite logical.

What were you thinking the day before when you failed the sprint?

- I didn't think about the relay at all.

All thoughts were connected only with the next start.

So I tried to tune in properly.

- By the way, what was the reason for your two standing mistakes in the sprint race?

Is it just the awkward approach to the shooting range that almost everyone in Hochfilzen is talking about?

- Yes.

I simply failed to cope with it.

Although there were no such problems in the pursuit.

- Explain: what does it mean - failed?

- It was necessary to enter the line more slowly.

But I realized this with a delay.

And in the sprint, I decided in advance to shoot while standing on one of the most extreme settings, because there are weaker gusts of wind.

I understood that for this I had to try to slow down the pace on the rise, but I did it too late, I had to slow down earlier.

So it turned out that he drove himself: there was not enough air, because of this, I had to take several breaths between shots, and in this case, it immediately starts to sausage, a strong tremor appears.

- That is, accurate shooting at a high pulse is not your option?

- It's not about the pulse, but about the breathing and the condition of the muscles.

- And if you set the task to work out all five shots at the turn while holding your breath?

Or is it for a fantasy biathlete?

- In competitions, one way or another, we still execute each of the shots on hold, otherwise the barrel begins to vibrate too much.

But all five ... Although I did this in training.