Biathlon IBU World Championships 2020

[Totallympics 69]

Biathlon IBU World Championships 2020

 

Antholz-Anterselva (ITA) - 13 February 2020 - 23 February 2020

 

 

Official Website

[heywoodu 15,353]

[hckošice 15,121]

  Team Slovakia 

 

 

 

 

Will be a strange Wch for team the first without Anastasiya Kuzmina, so the goals and expectations are now much lower.

So no special goals were required this time from the federation, basically just to attack seasons bests (especially among mens, since only Otčenáš won points this season so far and only 2 for his 39th place in the last stage)

 

However Paulína Fialková has her own personal goals and will try to win that historic medal (Sadly her injured knee is obvously a big obstacle in her efforts, but we all know that she is a great fighter and surely will puts everything on the races despite the unfortunate injury and obvious big limiting pain)

 

This is also the reason why Paja will not start in the mixed relays, Tomorrow for the classical Mixed Relay we will field a weak relay (Poliaková, V. Machyniaková, Šima, Otčenáš) which will probably be lapped already in the female part. The younger of the Fialková sisters Ivona will start in the single mixed relay with one of the mens later on the week.

[Monzanator 4,611]

Polish mixed relay squad for tomorrow is Zbylut-Zuk-Guzik-Szczurek. We never used this particular line-up before

 

Anterselva is of course the place where won it's only World Championship gold medal back in 1995 when a 21-year old student Tomasz Sikora won the individual event beating Jon Age Tyldum and Oleg Ryzhenkov. Tyldum went on to win the overall World Cup that season but was quickly overtaken by O.E. Bjoerndalen as Norway's team leader and retired at the age of 30 which I never really understood.

 

Ryzhenkov and Vladimir Dratchev had easily the fastest ski speed on the day and would have won gold even with one miss. They missed 2 & 3 times respectively.

 

 

 

 

 

[RobtheAggie 340]

US goes with the expected 4

Dunklee-Egan-Nordgren-Doherty  this has been standard since the retirement of Burke and Bailey.  I would be estatic for a top 6, but top 10 seems reasonable.

 

[Olympian1010 8,073]

  On 2/12/2020 at 4:56 PM, RobtheAggie said:

US goes with the expected 4

Dunklee-Egan-Nordgren-Doherty  this has been standard since the retirement of Burke and Bailey.  I would be estatic for a top 6, but top 10 seems reasonable.

 

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This is our best chance to do anything special really. Probably the best relay we’ve had in a while, which is great since our men are so weak right now. I really hope one of the women can pull an absolute miracle at these championships.

[RobtheAggie 340]

  On 2/12/2020 at 5:15 PM, Olympian1010 said:

This is our best chance to do anything special really. Probably the best relay we’ve had in a while, which is great since our men are so weak right now. I really hope one of the women can pull an absolute miracle at these championships.

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Yep, if the US gets anyone in the top 6 of any race, I would be ecstatic!

[RobtheAggie 340]

Italy goes Vittozzi -Wierer-Hofer-Windisch

 

I wonder how that first hand over will go?  Or how they team will line up for a picture if they get a medal?

[Olympian1010 8,073]

  On 2/12/2020 at 5:18 PM, RobtheAggie said:

Yep, if the US gets anyone in the top 6 of any race, I would be ecstatic!

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Top 5 in a relay or Top 10 (maybe 20 for the men) in an Individual would be enough for me low key

[heywoodu 15,353]

  On 2/12/2020 at 5:21 PM, RobtheAggie said:

Italy goes Vittozzi -Wierer-Hofer-Windisch

 

I wonder how that first hand over will go?  Or how they team will line up for a picture if they get a medal?

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Nothing special, I assume. Most likely they and everyone around will act as if nothing is going on