Estonia 13th in Winter Olympics men's biathlon relay
Estonia finished 13th in the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics men's 4x7.5 km biathlon relay on Tuesday.
The relay teams consist of four biathletes, who each ski 7.5 km (in the case of the men's event), each leg skied over three laps, with two shooting rounds to follow, one prone and one standing.
The Estonian biathletes have finished in the top ten three times in World Cup relays this season, while at the most recent on January 15 they crossed the line in fifth place.
The team of Rene Zahkna, Kristo Siimer, Mark-Markos Kehva and Jakob Kulbin said ahead of the Olympics that a top-ten finish would be a solid achievement for them.
"At the start of the season we felt that reaching the top 10 would require a very big success, but the last three relays have gone in a way that our level allows us to think a bit more about succeeding. It's not pressure, rather a pleasant excitement that it's quite doable," Zahkna said.
Individually this has not been the best Olympics for the Estonian men, so a place among the world's top teams would bring plenty of consolation.
Norway and France were pre-event favorites, at least based on World Cup performances, while Sweden, Germany and naturally Finland also deserve a mention.
On the day, Zahkna, skiing Estonia's opening leg, missed one shot in the standing stage and exited the range 13.7 seconds behind Norway, who were in first place. Next up for Estonia was Kristo Siimer, going onto the course in eighth position, 34.4 seconds behind the Norwegians. Siimer used one spare round in both shootings and came out of his standing stage in seventh place (+35.0).
Norway's second skier, Johan-Olav Botn, who had been in the lead after the opening leg, had to use all three spare rounds in his prone shooting, losing 40 seconds there and dropping to ninth. He shot clean in the standing stage, however, and Norway moved back up the order. In France's first standing stage, Fabien Claude had to ski a penalty loop and fell to last place, but Emilien Jacquelin powered France into the lead with a strong second leg.
At the halfway point France thus found themselves in the lead, followed by Finland (+0.5), Sweden (+2.7), Norway (+16.1), Switzerland (+31.5), Germany (+31.8), Slovenia (+41.6), Latvia (+42.8) and Estonia (+43.9).
Quentin Fillon Maillet (France) used one spare round in the fifth shooting stage, and his rivals also made mistakes; a miss in the standing stage left everything open for the final leg, as Sturla Holm Lægreid (Norway) and Martin Ponsiluoma (Sweden) shot clean and the three countries' athletes exited the range together.
Finland, Canada and Switzerland all had to ski penalty loops after the second shooting of the third leg, which Kehva took advantage of for Estonia, clearing the targets and moving up to sixth place (+1:29.4). Big-name rivals quickly caught Kulbin, however; one miss in the prone stage saw Estonia leave in 12th place (+2:25.0). One spare round was also required in the standing stage, leaving Estonia (0+6) to finish the event 13th, 3:53.6 behind winners France.
As France's anchor, Eric Perrot shot at high speed in the final stage and had to use two spare rounds, but Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen was unable to close the roughly ten-second gap, and Perrot, who had pushed himself to the limit, brought France (1+9) to the finish as first-time Olympic champions.
Norway took silver, Sweden bronze.
Germany, the U.S., the Czech Republic, Finland and Switzerland rounded out the top eight.
Hosts Italy (0+9) had an uncharacteristically, for these games, poor performance, finishing one place behind the Estonians.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte
