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Interesting to note that this IBU Cup could decide who gets the fourth Wild Card spot for Trimester 2's WC. (China had it for T1 but never used it). At the moment it looks like it's between Greece's Angelis and Bosnia's Plakalovic, having looked at their IBU point scores over the last 3 trimesters. Not sure which is ahead, their averages seem similar though..

Good point...Letting them host an event with this happening would be out of order. Starting athletes is a right, but hosting events is a privilege. And Russia in its form should have at the very least no privileges.

Interesting. Seems as well it's mostly female biathletes. I wonder if only the athletes will be banned or if there will be a greater ruling against Russia's participation as a whole.

Wonder if they write the whole thing on her jersey.. :D

Haha when both Michals on the Czech team screwed up theirs shots at the same time. Pretty happy with today's results though.Good to see Soukup back on form. As for Fourcade...let's just say he's made women's biathlon far more interesting in my eyes.

I think the other nations get 10 between them if I'm not mistaken.

In terms of wildcards for the World Champs I will make a prediction: Maria Tsakiri (Greece), Snejana Tiseeva (Moldova), and maybe Bruna if she really has improved that much. But I can't see anyone else getting close to 180. Maybe I'm missing someone? For the men it should be easier to fill, though.

Thing to remember with her- she's only 15!! She could be on the junior cup circuit for about 5 years.

Regardless of the position she did great today. And even if she shot clear she wouldn't have made the pursuit, so nothing to really regret about that one shot. Unfortunately Carine Leijn isn't in the pursuit even shooting clear

It will be tough. Very tough. But it was a good performance today.

We need others to miss too for her to make the pursuit, which isn't really happening, but good start!

Unfortunately, that does not come as a surprise. Is there anywhere one can view the list?

I am suddenly really excited to see how much she's improved in competition.

I hope Bruna qualifies for the World Championships! The good news is this year it's the top 30 instead of top 25 nations that automatically get spots, so the 10 wildcards this year will likely be from smaller nations. Basically Latvia, Spain, Britain, Bosnia, Hungary are all covered, and they were the ones who took many of the wildcards last year. And there's not that many athletes left, I think anyone who gets under 180 will automatically be chosen!

That's a big if. But yeah in clear conditions when everyone shoots well, Gabi would have no chance. As for Maria she hasn't missed a target this year! So who knows what she is capable of. The first time I read your comment I actually thought of Gabi Soukalova for a second. Hahaha. Well ours is the second best Gabi out there! Is Brazil going to the third Junior cup as well or are they instead going to the OECH? By the way what really annoys me is how they scheduled the World Junior Champs AFTER the World Champs, so many athletes who could have qualified through finishing in the top half can't now and have to rely on doing so last year

Yeah, I've seen that before, and I've always wondered what the story was! Maybe he was born on vacation. Who knows. By the way the race has been postponed for an hour. Possibly windy. So likely if the race does go ahead in an hour it will be tricky conditions.

Those are pretty decent margins! Keeping in mind of course this is the AWG. But she obviously has SOME class. I wonder how well she shoots. She did an interview where she was proud that she shot a reindeer and both shooting a reindeer and a biathlon target successfully have the same good feeling http://www.npr.org/sections/parallels/2016/03/12/469983624/at-arctic-winter-games-biathlons-stick-pulls-and-sledge-jumps And it seems the other athlete competed last year twice and both times finished dead last, though she was like 16 at the time.

Haha. Although let's hope the Bosnians race, too, it would be somewhat of a battle with Serbia... About Greenland one of their athletes is Uiloq Slettemark's 15 year old daughter who competed at the Arctic Winter Games apparently.

Let's hope she can get there! I will be watching. By the way it looks like there might be a relay of Serbian women...Godspeed Though Maja Drndic has had some decent results and is improving quite a bit since last year.

I hope you don't mind I'm abandoning Brazil as my team for this one race because Greenland Still wish well on Gabi of course! I agree if she shoots clear she could make the pursuit.

You're right! That in itself would be quite a milestone By the way there's a cross country skier from Egypt who looks like he is trying to qualify: http://www.vismaskiclassics.com/news/helmy-egypt-takes-ski-classics

Point of interest, as well: There was an athlete from Uruguay, Philip Schmid (not to be confused with the German WC racer) who competed in a FIS race in 2013, and I messaged him on Facebook about whether he will try and qualify, he says that 'he would love to' but he's studying at the moment and doesn't have much time to train so he 'probably' won't try qualifying this year. He said he'd let me know if he does, though. Apparently he lives in Switzerland now.

Also Bermuda could be back for 2018, but it's a longshot. They have a few freestyle skiiers who aren't doing too badly. https://data.fis-ski.com/global-links/search-a-athlete.html?listid=&lastname=&gender=ALL&sector=&firstname=&nation=BER&status=ALL&fiscode=&birthyear=&Search=Search&limit=50 And I know Puerto Rico will probably reject their quotas, but it is worth mentioning they do have an athlete near qualification position currently. I mean you never know. https://data.fis-ski.com/dynamic/athlete-biography.html?sector=AL&listid=&competitorid=210830

Qatar apparently has a curling team now which competed at the Mixed Doubles World Champs: http://www.dw.com/en/qatari-curlers-aiming-for-winter-olympics/av-19197290 Think they're just a BIT too optimistic about their prospects.

Yeah. I'm half-joking, they seem like a very efficient federation who gets things done. (*most things*)