January 30, 2010
Biathlon World Junior / Youth Championships: USA's Nordgren 6th
Posted by: Pat CoteSummary: Ethan Dreissigacker (Craftsbury/Dartmouth) moves on to pursuit final with 45th in today's World Youth Championship sprint.
Photos by Judy Geer.
Judy Geer enjoying the skiing between races.
Judy's husband Dick Dreissigacker takes a break to enjoy the views.
Ethan Dreissigacker raceing to 45th today.
Very cool to see an American in second place!
Leif was the big story, placing 6th in Junior Men. Today was the Sprint with top 60 moving on to tomorrow's pursuit.
Those moving on for the US are:
Youth men:
Casey Smith (Methow Valley, WA) 32nd
Ethan Dreissigacker (Craftsbury, Vermont) 45th
Youth women:
Afton Snyder 57th (Mt. Itasca, MN)
Kelly Kjorlein 58th (Mt. Itasca, MN)
Junior women:
Grace Boutot 45th (Maine WSC)
Addie Byrne 46th (Mt. Itasca)
From www.usbiathlon.com, by Viktoria Franke January 30, 2010
With the Junior-WCHs underway the US Biathlon Team posted yet another great result today with Leif Nordgren's 6th place in the junior men sprint competition.
At the finish Nordgren was 47.4 seconds behind today's winner Evgeny Petrov. The Russian showed two solid shootings at the range and took gold without having to go into the penalty loop. Nordgren on the other hand went 150m extra after one miss in standing. "The standing mistake was a real bummer. I have never shot clean in a race before, I was thinking about it today but thats not why I missed it. I was trying to shoot clean so I was taking my time, taking each target shot by shot. I over held the shot a little bit and it ended up as a miss. For the next three I sped up to a normal speed and they all fell fine", Nordgren explained the situation at the shooting range.
Photo: US Biathlon. Nordgren at the Flower Ceremony
An important fact though seems to be that he managed to stay clean in prone. After missing four targets during the Individual on Wednesday it was really important for him to show such a solid shooting today: "Before my start, I was watching the earlier starters on the range. Lots of them were missing one or two shots in prone. But I knew the conditions hadn't changed from zero so I wasn't to worried, and it worked out well!" With the conditions being as calm as today, Nordgren is sure that he can post some great shooting results at tomorrow's pursuit competition as well.
The only thing he was not quite satisfied with was his skiing: "The skiing today was not what I hoped for. I felt pretty good on the first lap but I was not able to keep up a good pace for the whole race. After the prone shoot I was really tired but I knew I was in a good position so I had to keep pushing hard. By the end I was totally out of energy and I'm not sure how much faster I could have skied" After pushing hard on the last meters Nordgren took his time in the finish area to catch his breath again.
Despite his skiing Nordgren seems confident that the pursuit might go even better than the Individual and Sprint competitions. "Most of the time I'm better in the second race so hopefully I'll be a little faster for tomorrow!"
Results Junior Men Sprint
| 1 | 35 | PETROV Evgeny | RUS | 0+0 | 0 | 25:12.5 | 0.0 | |
| 2 | 23 | MÜLLER Manuel | GER | 0+1 | 1 | 25:14.5 | +2.0 | |
| 3 | 47 | BARTH Tom | GER | 0+1 | 1 | 25:51.9 | +39.4 | |
| 4 | 54 | SOUCHAL Mathieu | FRA | 0+0 | 0 | 25:57.8 | +45.3 | |
| 5 | 76 | DOLL Benedikt | GER | 2+1 | 3 | 25:59.2 | +46.7 | |
| 6 | 48 | NORDGREN Leif | USA | 0+1 | 1 | 25:59.9 | +47.4 |
See schedule and full results below:
| Date | Distance | Discipline | Category | |
| 27.01. | 12.5 km | Individual | Youth Men | Results |
| 27.01. | 15 km | Individual | Junior Men | Results |
| 28.01. | 10 km | Individual | Youth Women | Results |
| 28.01. | 12.5 km | Individual | Junior Women | Results |
| 30.01. | 7.5 km | Sprint | Youth Men | Results |
| 30.01. | 10 km | Sprint | Junior Men | Results |
| 30.01. | 7.5 km | Sprint | Junior Women | Results |
| 30.01. | 6 km | Sprint | Youth Women | Results |
| 31.01. | 10 km | Pursuit | Youth Men | Start List / Results |
| 31.01. | 12.5 km | Pursuit | Junior Men | Start List / Results |
| 31.01. | 10 km | Pursuit | Junior Women | Start List / Results |
| 31.01. | 7.5 km | Pursuit | Youth Women | Start List / Results |
| 02.02. | 4 x 7.5 km | Relay | Junior Men | Start List / Results |
| 02.02. | 3 x 7.5 km | Relay | Youth Men | Start List / Results |
| 02.02. | 3 x 6 km | Relay | Junior Women | Start List / Results |
| 02.02. | 3 x 6 km | Relay | Youth Women | Start List / Results |
