Werloc

Well, you cannot expect immediate success from junior level. Especially if you're Norwegian, French, Russian, German etc. when it takes you years & years to even get on board on the world cup team. There's also the phenomenon where in some years, the biathletes are not as strong, so it's easier to win. I have been looking back at a lot of statistics, following how many Youth & Junior biathletes actually end up achieving success and what is interesting, is that it's usually the hard-working athletes that just don't quit that end up making it further with a lot of those prior winners simply ending their sports careers for different opportunities in life or other reasons. In the case of Doherty, barely any biathletes from his age group have started in the world cup. Emillien Jacquelin comes to mind. Felix Leitner from Austria is slowly moving up the ranks. Pettersen going through the Norwegian ranks, Ponsiluoma sneaking a surprise podium for Sweden in the world cup. After that, there are some that are starting in the world cup from small teams and a few that are stuck at ibu cup level. Looking at the stats of this generation, Doherty still needs a couple of years to produce his best results.

This comment feels so familiar... Even if we have athletes that are talented in youth & junior level, we are always left behind in the senior level

Well, not the most successful race for our boys. Linas missed a bit too much and Nikita still needs to put in a lot of work with the ski speed. Other than that, this still looks like one of the most successful Youth & Junior championships for us with the worst performance of 41st place up to now.

Well, everyone that knows me on the forum probably knows that I love stats and I love going back in time, so this time I was considering who is still active in the world cup from the previous winners that haven't won a race in a while and how long it's been since their success. I think that is fairly interesting, so let's start with the women: Anna Frolina - - 2008/09 - Antholz - Pursuit (1) Magdalena Gwizdon - - 2012/13 - Sochi - Sprint (2) Selina Gasparin - - 2013/14 - Hochfilzen - Sprint (2) Synnoeve Solemdal - - 2013/14 - Hochfilzen - Pursuit (2) Anais Bescond - - 2013/14 - Antholz - Sprint (1) Katharina Innerhofer - - 2013/14 - Pokljuka - Sprint (1) Veronika Vitkova - - 2014/15 - Oberhof - Sprint (1) Valj Semerenko - - 2014/15 - Kontiolahti - Mass Start (2) Franziska Hildebrand - - 2015/16 - Rupholding - Sprint (2) Ekaterina Yurlova-Percht - - 2015/16 - Antholz - Pursuit (2) Olena Pidrushina - - 2015/16 - Canmore - Sprint (2) Anais Chevalier - - 2016/17 - Nove Mesto - Pursuit (1) Nadine Horchler - - 2016/17 - Antholz - Mass Start (1) Denise Herrmann - - 2017/18 - Ostersund - Pursuit (2) Justine Braisaz - - 2017/18 - Annecy - Mass Start (1) Tiril Eckhoff - - 2017/18 - Antholz - Sprint (5) Vanessa Hinz - - 2017/18 - Kontiolahti - Mass Start (1) Well, you can mostly see a pattern that the athletes won only once or twice in their career, a lot of the wins came from Antholz and not a single (last recorded) win came from the individual. As for the men: Michal Slesingr - - 2007/08 - Oslo - Mass Start (1) Dominik Landertinger - - 2009/10 - Khantiy-Mansiysk - Mass Start (2) Fredrik Lindstrom - - 2011/12 - Antholz - Sprint (1) Evgeniy Garanichev - - 2011/12 - Oslo - Sprint (1) Dmitry Malyshko - - 2012/13 - Oberhof - Pursuit (2) Ondrej Moravec - - 2012/13 - Oslo - Mass Start (1) Lukas Hofer - - 2013/14 - Antholz - Sprint (1) Jakov Fak - - 2014/15 - Khantiy-Mansiysk - Mass Start (8) Simon Eder - - 2015/16 - Rupholding - Pursuit (3) Erik Lesser - - 2015/16 - Rupholding - Mass Start (2) Dominik Windisch - - 2015/16 - Canmore - Mass Start (1) Anton Babikov - - 2016/17 - Ostersund - Pursuit (1) Benedikt Doll - - 2016/17 - Hochfilzen - Sprint (1) Simon Schempp - - 2016/17 - Hochfilzen - Mass Start (12) Arnd Peiffer - - 2016/17 - Kontiolahti - Pursuit (8) Tarjei Boe - - 2017/18 - Ostersund - Sprint (9) Julian Eberhardt - - 2017/18 - Kontiolahti - Mass Start (4) Henrik L'abee-Lund - - 2017/18 - Oslo - Sprint (1) Fairly evident that German hopes and dreams are destroyed by Johannes and Martin. Quite a few multi-winners like Tarjei, Arnd, Julian, Jakov, Simon with a year or more since last win. Some surprises for me: Bescond, Vitkova, Doll only on a single win. Lastly, it's been a very long time since Landertinger last had a win.

You're just jealous that the Italian flag is not blue and Lukas and Dominik are not winning world cups

named the other possible candidates.

aaaaaaand it's not Johannes for a change we go up to four different winners.

The Dahlmeier effect. German girls raise their game. This time it was Hinz

Well, could have been amazing with some better shooting, but a pretty respectable showing for our boys. Tomorrow an opportunity to medal with Linas Banys, wonder if he'll use it.

Well, could have been a lot of worse, but sad for a missed opportunity.

Yeah, but ours do that on the regular.

I'm scared to comment, he is one of those factors that can miss 4 out of nowhere in the middle of a good race

M.Faster might be faster, but that didn't stop him from missing 4 in the prone

One of my favourite events is under way!

Nice voice from France, although he is definitely struggling to control it at times, so I don't think this is going to challenge for the top spots in the final.

Oh my goodness, this is perfect I hope you told her that it wouldn't be weird if she had a picture of a potato at school. That's like taking away kids pictures from parents' wallets...

You might take Cycling out of Athletics, but you can't take Athletics out of Track

Honestly, if they want to keep experimenting with various events, an athletics elimination race would be an interesting sight to see I wouldn't even mind if it went Olympic, cause it would combine both endurance and the ability to sprint. And probably would make me feel a bit more invested than 10000m. races.

Based on my highly advanced analysis, I predict that Johannes is not winning the Antholz sprint.

I love women's biathlon, would be more fun with Makarainen and Dahlmeier on form

Sidenote, I've never seen this much of unhappiness in this forum when Fourcade was winning every single race for the past 7 years or more. Even if it's not exactly interesting, I'm glad we're going to have a different total score leader since 2011.

The shot where Johannes, Martin and Julian glided past Weger, Christiansen and Mallet was beautifully cinematic

Last lap was the podium that everybody wanted VS the podium that everybody expected

Problem is, we are capable of being top 15, but we never manage to show up. Even if three guys are healthy and ready to fight, there will always be one doing penalty loops

After tonight, she's gonna be Gone-tier from the relay for sure