The IBU Summer Biathlon World Championships at Tehvandi Sports Center
continued on Friday, August 23, with adult super sprints. As the best of
Estonians, both Rene Zahkna and Susan Külm finished 10th in the super sprint
finals. One of the top contenders, Fabien Claude, had to settle for the 11th
place.
In the men's category, gold medal in the super sprint went to the Ukrainian biathlete
Dmytro Pidruchnyi, who had only one miss in the shooting range. The silver medal
was also won by a Ukrainian athlete, Artem Tyshchenko (1; +5.2), and the bronze
went to the Czech Tomáš Mikyska. Of Estonians, the best was Rene Zahkna, who
finished the race in the 10th place (5; +43.1).
Fabien Claude of the French team, who finished 11th in the super sprint final,
described the race as having been extremely fast. "The race was very intense. At the
moment, I am definitely having a period where I am not used to such an effort. I
came here to enjoy the atmosphere of a major competition and I'm glad I did,"
Claude summed up the competition.
Fabien is not the only Claude to have been in the starting lineup today. His brothers
Florent and Emilien are also competing in Otepää. "We have a joke that it is our
family business," Claude said, smirking. "I think it's definitely our advantage to be able to train together and also compete against each other, but brotherhood alone
isn't enough to get to the top," he admitted. Florent Claude, who represents the
Belgian team, and Emilien, who is competing for France, only took part in the
preliminary races today. "Unfortunately, I was the only one to make it to the finals
today, but that’s how biathlon is. I hope that tomorrow, we can fight for the best
places together," Claude said.
In the women's category, the Slovak Paulina Batovska Fialkova came first, having
one miss in the shooting range. The Finn Suvi Minkkinen (1; +11.5) took the second
place and the Czech biathlete Lucie Charvatova (5; +20.2) finished third. Of Estonian
women, Susan Külm with her 10th place was the best (4; +1:06.5). She was followed
by Johanna Talihärm in the 13th place (4; +1:22.8) and Tuuli Tomingas in the 23rd
place (6; +2:06.6).
The Summer Biathlon World Championships will continue on Saturday, August 24,
when both the junior and adult sprint world champions will be crowned. Spectators
can cheer on the athletes from both the shooting range grandstand and the track. In
the evening, you can enjoy concerts by Nublu and Curly Strings.
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