NSW BIATHLONGg ASSOCIATION E-News Bulletin Issue No. 4 15 March 2013 G g G Recent Results... g • Alex Almoukov placed 33rd position in the WC Individual Race • Dyllan Harmer finishing 50th at Open European Championships Junior Men Sprint • Damon Morton finishing 53rd at Open European Championships Junior Men Sprint • Daniel Walker achieving 22.2% behind in the Sprint at IBU Cup No 7 Orslbie (SVK) • Lucy Glanville finishing 44th at Open European Championships Women's Sprint

Alex Almoukov at Sochi And the Winner is... Almoukov Powers into Top 40 at World Cup! Congratulations to Mrs I. Contarino on winning the World Championships Bib signed by Alex Almoukov for sending Alex Almoukov delivered his best result ever for AUS at the Sochi World Cup her message of support to the NSW No 8 test event last week. Shooting clean, Almoukov skied to perfection and finished in 33rd place in the Men's Individual. Finishing in the Top 50 is new biathletes on Facebook during World ground for Almoukov and also means he now has the option of entering a Championships. better start group for the next and last World Cup of the season in Khanty Manisysk (RUS). allows the Top 50 finishers to choose either of start group 2, 3 or 4 which becomes very important when, for example, snow is forecast as under snow conditions the course gets slower and slower as the race proceeds which can severely disadvantage the athletes who are unable to enter the earlier start groups. The result will also cement Almoukov's World Cup starting positions for 2013-14 season leading into the Sochi Olympics. In the World Cup standings, leaders Martin Fourcade (FRA) and (NOR) have unassailable leads and the interest will now be if Berger can match the record of great Norwegian biathlete Ole Einar Bjoerndalen by winning 14 titles in a season... She is currently on 11!

Martin Fourcade (FRA) Tora Berger (NOR) Open European Championships... 5 AUS athletes competed at the European Championships in Bankso (BUL) from 20th February to 27th February. These Championships known as "Open" (as opposed to closed) because anyone can enter not just European citizens. They have an age restriction of U26. The Biathlon Course in Bankso is some 1600m above sea level and the altitude was always going to prove a little difficult but it was a matter of arrive, assess the course during training and then race... and hope the altitude effect didn't hit until after racing was finished! AUS Wax Technician, Dimtrii Some good results were achieved in the Junior Boys with Dyllan Harmer and Damon Morton both qualifying for the Pursuit Race. Lucy Glanville unfortunately developed a sore throat on Day 2 and only recovered to race in the Sprint on the last day where he skiing, which has been the strong point of her 2012-13 season, dropped away due to her illness. Alex Almoukov delivered a fantastic 27th Dyllan Harmer at OECH! position in the Men's Individual (shooting 1,0,0,0) and was in a tremendous position to deliver AUS best ever result at European Championships when fog twice stopped his Sprint race. At the time IBU Cup Athletes Finish Season... of the race cancelation on both days, Almoukov was in the Top 15.

AUS IBU Cup biathletes Daniel Walker, Dyllan Harmer, Cameron Morton and Lucy Glanville have finished their IBU Cup season for 2012-13. While Cameron Morton returned to AUS immediately after World Championships due to work commitments, the younger NSW trio of Harmer, Walker and Glanville arrived back in AUS last Wednesday after the most successful season ever for AUS at the IBU Cup level. Season 2012-13 had a number of firsts: • The greatest number of athletes to represent AUS for an entire season at IBU Cup. • All athletes are qualified to start on IBU Cup for the 2013-14 season. • Lucy Glanville achieved an Olympic ranking position for AUS in Women - the first ranking in 15 years. • Daniel Walker achieving Top 30 at World Juniors. • 3 IBU Cup athletes (Morton, Walker and Glanville) achieving World Championships qualification. • 3 athletes qualifying for Pursuits during the season due to Athletes at Munich Airport finishing Top 60 in their Sprint race. While IBU Cup is the level of competition immediately Did You Know... below World Cup, many WC athletes continually move between WC and IBU Cup and it is a tough tough Waxing skis for IBU races is so very important. While AUS has finally been competition. Sustaining qualification to IBU Cup requires a able to engage the services of a dedicated wax technician for OECH (due to biathlete to be committed and in almost constant training some very supportive financial donations), other teams have services of a and to qualify from IBU Cup to World Cup requires an dedicated team of wax technicians and some even a wax technician truck! athlete to be virtually full-time training and to travel on the IBU circuit from November to March each season. The Dimirtii Maleev from was engaged as the wax technician for AUS at young trio of NSW biathletes - Harmer, Walker and OECH which allowed coach Nick Almoukov to spend valuable coaching Glanville - are now intending to join Alex Almoukov in full time with the athletes right up until they raced instead of having to be time training during the 2013 European Summer in order to distracted with last minute wax considerations. All the athletes noted the further their development and improve the ranking of AUS benefit of having a dedicated wax technician and it will definitely be needed internationally. again when AUS has more than 3 athletes competing at an event.

Russian Wax Tech Truck! Just some of the very large French Wax Tech Team! AUS Wax Tech, Dimitri Maleev k k k k