Team USA at a Biathlon practice session ahead of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games on January 31, 2022 in Zhangjiakou, China
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Team USA at a Biathlon practice session ahead of the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympic Games on January 31, 2022 in Zhangjiakou, China
Matthias Hangst / Getty Images
BEIJING – Saturday marks the first day medals are awarded at the 2022 Winter Olympics.
And here is the first chance at this Game for US Biathlon team to break through.
The American biathers have the distinction of being the only US Olympic athletes who have never stood on the podium to receive a medal.
Innovations since the last Olympic Games are giving rise to hope that the United States may eventually finish third in one of the traditional, cross-country skiing events. dominated by Europeans.
Biathlon like baseball
United States track and field athlete Clare Egan arrived in China ready for the question – Why is there no medal of the United States? – and armed with an answer that those who know nothing about her quirky sport can understand.
“In baseball,” Egan said, “even very, very good athletes get three hits out of 10 while they’re holding the bat.”
That is, failure happens more often than success.
The same is true in pentathlon, says Egan. Over the past decade, America has had some of its best athletes and has been successful.
Lowell Bailey is the 2017 world champion. Susan Dunklee, who is in China for her third and final Olympics, has won two World Championships silver medals. Before her, Tim Burke won one. But neither they nor any other American biath athlete could pick the right timing at the Olympic Games.
“We might have 30 races during the winter,” Egan said, “but the Olympics come every four years and it’s just a few. So statistically, it’s likely that we can get to the podium. on any given day is pretty low.”
And before you say, all the Norwegians and Germans seem to have no trouble winning Olympic medals, consider this: biathlon, in those and other European countries, is very popular and heavily funded. There are a lot of Europeans participating in international competitions, so statistically those countries have a better chance of winning medals.
But they can also… attack.
In 2018, Kaisa Leena Mäkäräinen of Finland, the women’s team that topped the World Cup for the Winter Olympics, failed at the Olympics.
“That’s not a surprise to us,” Egan said, “because it’s like baseball.”
Biathlon’s unique challenge
Indeed, the unique nature of biathlon can help you, whether you come from a great country or America., with a small-engine-that-may attitude.
“Biathlon is a very unpredictable sport,” said Max Cobb, president of the US Biathlon.
It combines cross-country skiing and target shooting – it’s the COMBINATION part that makes it really hard. Cobb says that no matter how good of a marksman you are with a 22-caliber biathlon, try doing this move on your stomach, after charging around the ski slopes and your heart rate up to 170.
“It was incredibly challenging,” Cobb said. “From the prone position, you [trying to hit a target] the size of a golf ball from 165 feet away. And you’re trying to capture at least every two seconds if not less. “
Much of the unpredictability happens on the shooting range. And it can have a drastic effect on the overall outcome.
When it comes to distance, swimmers can lead the event, but if they stop shooting because they can’t control their chest heaving, gusts of wind, or snow, the lead could disappear.
Athletes from Team USA practice during a biathlon practice session at the National Biathlon Center in Zhangjiakou on February 2, 2022.
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Athletes from Team USA practice during a biathlon practice session at the National Biathlon Center in Zhangjiakou on February 2, 2022.
Tobias Schwarz / AFP via Getty Images
Changes in the past four years
Since the 2018 Olympics, when the US finished with fewer medals again, Cobb said the program has taken steps to end the drought.
They worked more often with Matt Emmons, a former Summer Olympic gold medalist in shooting. They did some creative things with the athlete’s skateboard.
“The key thing in ski preparation for Nordic skiing is breaking the surface tension,” says Cobb. Essentially, this tension exists as the ski gear glides over the snow and a thin film of water is created. With all types of Snow Crystals available and different temperature and humidity parameters, there is almost no limit to the number of ski prep techniques we use to try and essentially improve the degree of accuracy. slide by breaking the surface tension of the snow. “
That includes changes to the structure of the ski facility.
“It was our most closely guarded secret,” Cobb said, “but it really worked.”
And perhaps recent results show all this.
“We had some really great performances on our team at our last World Cup. [event] before the Olympics,” said Egan. Paul [Schommer of the men’s team] got ninth place [in the 20km Men’s Individual race] It was a personal best for him. His first Top 10 at a World Cup. We also have the best women’s relay record since the early 1990s. We finished fifth and that was very exciting for us. “
And then Egan had his second-best World Cup result ever, placing fourth in the individual 15km race in Antholz, Italy.
“All of that was really exciting,” Egan said. “I think it shows that our team is hitting form at the right time.”
So will Egan or any other rising American be the one to overtake the biath athletes at the Beijing Olympics?
Egan doesn’t want to talk about it – in fact, that’s the American team’s strategy.
“One of the things we say in biathlon, is the more you want, the less likely you are to get it,” says Cobb. “
A sports psychologist works with athletes on mental focus and techniques for refocusing when the mind is more focused on the outcome than the process.
Especially in the shooting phase.
“If you start thinking about what it means to hit those targets,” Cobb said.
So American track and field athletes will continue to hear questions – why no medal? – but let their mind and eyes follow the ski tracks and shoot the targets in front of them.
And at the end of the process, it’s possible that one, or more, can finally beat that home run in the triathlon.
