Werloc

Really waiting for tomorrow. Another four additional athletes starting for Lithuania that were kept away from the individual race due to their age. So we're starting 4 boys and 2 girls.

In all honesty, Ukraine looks non-existent this season. Apart from Dzhima's win, when did we actually see anyone contend? You couldn't even tell that the Semerenko sisters are both in the world cup, because we haven't heard them and haven't seen them do anything yet. The highest world cup overall athletes from women right now is Olena Pidrushina at 34 with Dzhima, Semerenko's, Merkushina often struggling to even quality to a pursuit race... 2017-18 season after Antholz we had Vita at 10, Valj at 14, Dzhima at 16, Merkushina at 32 They have better luck with men this season at 24 and 29 after Antholz...

Nah, the main reason is focusing on the European Championships, where it's usually the only chance to make money and get government financing for our athletes, so those two stages were planned to be skipped to be at the best form possible for the ECH and then WCH.

Lithuania had mixed plans about the stages in Canada and USA, but at the moment, it seems that we are going to be sending our strongest athletes, simply due to not really having anybody else to send as well as unreliable nation cup positions.

Reminiscing from my recent winner stats, it's actually utterly crazy that there are only 5 women on the tour that have won a world cup race more than twice. So many retirements left a lot of space for new talents to shine and with some of the greats underperforming, we already have five new winners.

She needs two more overall crystal globes and then she's done

Yeah, that's another good question. Perhaps Russia didn't want him to have hobbies anymore after he quit to Belarus

Holy shit, you're right. Birthday April 19th for both. That's some handy detective work, also a bit creepy as well that he had to change his name.

She stated herself that she is not planning to have a long sports career. She was dubbed the new Neuner and is already planning a Neuner-ish exit.

We can also add to the discussion with Dahlmeier having 4 WCH ind. golds + 3 WCH relay gold as well as additional 6 WCH medals, two Olympic golds. With Johannes still at 2 WCH ind. golds + 1 WCH relay hold, additional 6 WCH medals (3 from relay) and 1 Olympic gold. With Dahlmeier always missing 30% of the programme, so I wouldn't put Johannes above her in the talent department, I think they're both equally talented.

You could probably argue that she is, because unlike Boe, she already has an overall crystal globe as well as is dominating every major event that she attends in a highly competitive field of women. On top of that, she would have probably won 2017-18 as well, if she didn't miss Ostersund. She also missed a ton of races in 2014/15, 2015/16 and this season too, her biggest enemy is her health.

Yeah, I edited later to mention that I am not counting Olympics, since it's not a World Cup affair.

Well, I think Dahlmeier is also a major talent, although she's being held back by a lot of illnesses. On the men's side, it's difficult to make a breakthrough when there's only the bronze spot on the podium left for endless amount of years It's nearly two years since a German male biathlete had a victory, the last one in March 2017 by Peiffer, when both Fourcade and Boe missed the podium. (Just in case, I decided to not count Olympics in, since it's not considered world cup status)

I don't think there is a need to announce every single result change after exchanges and shooting, because everybody has the live results available to them.

Wow, thank you, Lind, for trying to enforce my point that I just made

This is pretty much the promoted Swedish youth world champion relay, I wonder if they can repeat the success

Sweden is very strict with their team this year. They gave Hogberg and Andersson one chance this year even though they have been breezing through the ibu cup this season. I still think that Hogberg would be a better bet than Nilsson and perhaps Magnusson as well.

We often forget how many outside factors actually impact the athletes that we see on TV, one of the biggest factors why it is difficult to see a stable progression from junior-to-senior is the unexpected thing that we call life. Some athletes don't have good training conditions (especially in smaller Biathlon nations, it is easier to win with talent when you are younger, but senior level is all about infrastructure) Some athletes are full time government supported athletes, other athletes support themselves or their families with additional jobs, leaving them with less energy or less frequent training Some great athletes are stopped by multiple injuries, they miss seasons of training etc. Some athletes lose motivation, we have to remember that we're talking about young indecisive people. I am 24 and I still sometimes have no idea what I am doing and here we are talking about 20-22 year olds at university. Training staff - some training staff can bring the best out of their athletes, some just have a reputation of not producing the best from their athletes. Best example: Sweden under Pichler and how atrociously bad Sweden was without Pichler. And these are only some of the factors, there are a lot more, because every single journey is different and every single problem affects every individual in different ways.

She was on her way towards good results, but she missed an entire season, I assume to injury? Edit: as for showing talent, it is a positive thing for most athletes, but quite detrimental to some. When you easily beat everyone around your age and are immediately thrust into senior environment with 70th-80th places, some people are motivated through it and some people don't work hard enough and quit.

Well, that's a problem that every sport has. My friend is extremely cynical towards results in younger categories, because a massive amount of athletes drop out after they finish school or after they finish university, because that's when you have to get a job and have to support yourself and many people don't see sports as a reliable way to support yourself.

Well, if we're looking at this situation that straightforwardly, then it means that every single junior world champion still needs to beat the other 12-20 junior world champions from earlier years as well to get their hands on that overall crystal globe At this very moment, it is Wierer beating: Davidova Oeberg Vasnetcova Zhurakov Pavlova Frolina Bankes Zuk Dahlmeier and Johannes is destroying: Kuehn Eder Leitner Desthieux Hofer Loginov Slesingr Pettersen Roesch Doherty Claude Latypov Surprisingly enough, there is only one athlete in this junior world champion list that actually has an overall crystal globe and I guess that should be a nice tell how much impact that title does have to your success. It all depends on the character and on the training. Makarainen was a horrible junior, but she had character.

Yup, that is felt even more in our team, when we don't even have enough athletes to fill the three cups, not even the 3 starter positions for the women's world cup... Every single one of our successful juniors have not really made an impact in senior biathlon, sadly.

Oh my goodness... This is priceless. Will she attend the 60th annual potato pancake festival in 2022?

So, since we sparked the discussion, I thought I would look this up for funsies: How many junior category medalists we actually lost in Biathlon since 2009/10 season 2010 Yann Guigonnet (France) - individual gold (quit in 2015) Michael Galassi (Italy) - individual silver (quit in 2013) Tom Barth (Germany) - individual bronze, sprint bronze (quit in 2013) Reka Forika (Romania) - individual gold (quit in 2016) Leslie Mercier (France) - individual bronze) (quit in 2011) Evgeny Petrov (Russia) - sprint gold, pursuit bronze (quit in 2011) Manuel Muller (Germany) - sprint silver, pursuit gold (quit in 2011) Sophie Boilley (France) - sprint silver, pursuit gold (quit in 2015) Vladimir Alenishko (Russia) - pursuit silver (quit in 2014) Nastassia Kalina (Russia) - pursuit silver (quit in 2015) 2011 Aleksandra Alikina (Russia) - sprint silver, pursuit silver (quit in 2013) Tom Barth (Germany) - sprint gold, pursuit bronze (quit in 2013) Ludwig Ehrhart (France) - sprint bronze, pursuit silver (quit in 2012) Nikolay Yakushov (Russia) - individual bronze (quit in 2012) Florie Vigneron (France) - individual bronze (quit in 2011) 2012 Elena Badanina (Russia) - individual bronze (quit in 2013) Kurtis Wenzel (Canada) - individual gold (quit in 2013) Marius Hol (Norway) - individual silver (quit in 2012) Elena Ankudinova (Russia) - sprint gold (quit in 2015) 2013 Dino Butkovic (Croatia) - individual silver (quit in 2014) 2014 Jarle Gjoerven (Norway) - pursuit silver (quit in 2014) Dany Chavoutier (France) - individual bronze (quit in 2014) 2015 Aleksandr Dediukhin (Russia) - individual silver, sprint gold (quit in 2015) Vemund Gurigard (Norway) - individual bronze, sprint silver (quit in 2015) Lena Arnaud (France) - sprint gold (quit in 2018) 2016 Susanna Kurzthaler (Austria) - individual gold (quit in 2016) Andrea Baretto (Italy) - individual silver (quit in 2017) 2017 Nikita Lobastov (Russia) - individual bronze (quit in 2018) Kirill Streltsov (Russia) - sprint silver (quit in 2018) 2018 Sturla Laegreid (Norway) - individual silver (quit in 2018) Sverre Aspenes (Norway) - sprint bronze, pursuit gold (quit in 2018) A lot of these cases, the juniors dropped the sport mostly after the junior championships, some of them trying a couple of IBU races. A lot of Russians and Norwegians, I think some might have quit since it's very hard making the team and most of others left the sport, because it was their hobby and they did not want that as a career after university. Lastly, a lot of them are medalists from the individual race. Sidenote: Tom Barth looked like he had a lot of potential.

Especially with the fact that not every single winner is destined for crystal globes, but when you see someone special, you just know. For example, Laura Dahlmeier's relay performance demonstrated that she is a winner and that she will be big.