OlympicsFan

Yeah ... and if my grandma would have wheels, she would be a bicycle ...

Really sad to see how weak slalom has gotten. I just looked at the results of the 2014 Olympics and back then you still had 10 medal contenders (Shiffrin, Holdener, Zettel, Kirchgasser, Schild, Höfl-Riesch, Maze, Hansdotter, Poutiainen, Pietilä-Holmner). Will be really interesting to see if a) Shiffrin can bounce back for the Olympics b) Austria will keep their massive material advantage.

Today would have been her big chance. So far she has 12 2nd places and 13 3rd places ...

I don’t like Shiffrin, but she is truly a magician, she will probably end her career as best female alpine skiing athlete ever.

Weird comparison ... In the 4 x 100 m relay you can make up a lot of time with great exchanges, something similar isn’t possible in biathlon. I would rather see it like this: France/Sweden have many athletes who are inconsistent, but can make the podium on a good day without other athletes failing. Ukraine on the other hand has 4 consistent athletes who can’t make an individual podium without other athletes failing. France/Sweden win more individual medals, because they only need one of their athletes to have a good day, but in the relay Ukraine wins more medals because Sweden/France almost always have one athlete who messes up and destroys their medal hopes. I think this is usually the reason, not sure what happened today with the French women in the cross-country, maybe they had bad material. Hettich was incredibly slow, hard to imagine that France was even slower ...

I know that you like to troll, but maybe you should drop it if you want a serious discussion. I never said that Hammerschmidt is world-class, but she certainly has been world class before, which is pretty obvious when you look at her results. Hettich was incredibly slow today, hard to imagine even someone like Voigt would have done worse.

It feels as if Ukraine almost always overperforms in the relay. Normally they shouldn’t beat Russia/France/Sweden that often.

Wow, really weird. Usually French ladies are very good in cross-country, certainly better than Germany for example. At least their men make up for it.

What a surprising turnaround. I don’t even want to imagine what would have been possible without a roadblock like Hettich. Somehow German coaches always find a way to sabotage their own team, I still have nightmares from the 2010 Olympics ... Norway certainly deserved the gold, but them dominating biathlon is the worst thing that can happen to this sport. They already ruined cross-country. Biathlon relays, especially on the women’s side, are among the most unpredictable team events, much better than pointless events like cross-country/luge/ski jumping/Nordic combined team events.

Sadly women’s slalom has been a joke for quite some time. 5 realistic medal contenders at best, the speed events are clearly more competitive. Really unusual for Germany to win medals in the most competitive events while failing to medal in the joke events (women’s slalom and alpine combined).

I certainly don’t miss Norwegians dominating every single event. I feel like whenever one of the Norwegians declines or retires there are five new ones who are suddenly world class. It still has to be mentioned that the results might have been very different if all the Norwegian guys would have competed. Maybe they don’t like the conditions, but they still won the team competition. Kristoffersen has been pretty trash in the giant slalom all season long, I wouldn’t read anything into it. I don’t know anything about the other athletes you mentioned, but I don’t think that they were considered medal contenders.

I am not talking about the condition of the course. I am talking about the fact that a) Most of the favorites didn’t even bother to show up in the parallel slalom b) A gazillion Norwegian guys who could have medaled are injured c) Many athletes not being in top shape thanks to COVID.

No, certainly not. The parallel event and the combined are joke events. I already wrote a couple days ago that a bronze in the super g for example is more valuable than a gold in the combined, which is infinitely more valuable than a gold in the parallel competition. In the end most of the results here are not relevant thanks to the conditions.

I was only talking about relevant events.

Easily one of the most absurd results in the history of alpine skiing World Championships. None of the top 3 deserved a medal after this season. Fabre probably can‘t believe that he won a single medal here, but him winning gold is completely ridiculous. At least he can now retire in peace. Austria‘s absurd luck sadly also continues. They win gold in every competition where they have a medal chance and bronze in events where they have no business of winning medals (men‘s/women‘s giant slalom). At least Italy finally got it‘s first and probably last medal. Italy wasn’t a good host, but it still would have been sad to see them „leaving“ empty-handed. The guys who won the medals are 17th, 11th and 21st in the giant slalom World Cup. Fabre and Schwarz are easily already among the biggest overperformers in the history of alpine skiing world championships.

Americans must have insane material when one of their random no-names can compete for a medal. Shiffrin not being in too shape is very good for the competition. Italy must be the most disappointed nation at this event, crazy that a nation with one good athlete (USA) can win more medals than a nation with so many world-class athletes.

Really crazy that they can win this with such a trash team. Not a good sign for this event.

Cool, here is a list of women who had a better time today: Erin Mielzynski Gabriela Capova Thea Stjernesund Kristina Riis-Johannessen Erika Pykalainen Sara Hector Andreja Slokar Estelle Alphand Ana Bucik Wendy Holdener Cassidy Gray Paula Moltzan Katharina Liensberger

Yes, everyone (except the German coach) realized that about an hour ago. In the end it probably wouldn’t have mattered because the German women were absurdly slow. Too bad Rebensburg retired. I wouldn’t really call this a team competition, you only need one fast man and one fast woman.

I remember her doing the same at junior level. I am not sure whether she will ever be able to fix her shooting. Some years ago there was a girl from Kazakhstan who was in a similar position but never fixed her shooting. Also very weird to see someone from Bulgaria skiing that fast, considering that they are completely nonexistent in cross-country.

It is very unlikely that the race will unfold like that.

Not sure how the medals for Germany were luck, please inform me. Also a bronze medal in an Olympic event (combined excluded) is worth ten times more than a gold in an event were the favorites didn’t even bother to show up.

I kind of like this result. Davidova is one of my favorite athletes in biathlon. A medal for Öberg was pretty much a guarantee. German athletes consistent as usual, but always with one miss too much. Who would have thought before this season that Preuß would beat Herrmann in an individual with the same number of misses. Just shows how horrible Herrmann is this season. Personally I would prefer it if biathlon world championships would only take place every 2 years. Having them every year makes the results pretty much meaningless. Mironova could still win a medal sadly.

Sure, why not ... Germany doesn’t have a medal chance anyways and apart from Dürr, all German girls are on an equally low level, so you might as well give her a shot.

Thanks, I thought that the combined got eliminated? Sad to hear that this event will still be Olympic. I think 4 individual events are enough for alpine skiing, but at the same time alpine skiing definitely should have more Events than speed skating/shorttrack/freestyle skiing, so you would probably have to reduce the number of events there as well.