The Olympic Winter Games are coming up. Hundreds of athletes compete for medals in South Korea, but who do you have to pay special attention to?
SPOX takes a look at the Olympics 2018 superstars and discusses their respective situations. Among others: Martin Fourcade, Lindsey Vonn, Mikaela Shiffrin, Marcel Hirscher and Shaun White.
At the 2007/08 season finale Martin Fourcade, a teenager from southern France, made his debut in the Biathlon World Cup with a 61st place at the finish. He had just missed the qualification for the pursuit by a narrow margin. It was the beginning of a steep ascent. He quickly established himself as a permanent force in the French World Cup squad, where the resignation of biathlon legend Raphael Poiree left a big gap.
Fourcade didn’t fill that gap, he pulverized it. His Olympic star was awarded in Vancouver in 2010 when, after disappointing performances in the sprint and single, he won the silver medal in the mass start. After the Vancouver games, Fourcade continued to perform seamlessly and became more consistent. The Frenchman scored run fastest times in rows, and can often afford a mistake more than the competition – if he makes mistakes at all.
Since the 2011/12 season, Fourcade has always won the overall World Cup, beating all of Idol Poiree’s best scores. In the 2012/13 season, he equalled the points record in the overall World Cup at the end of a biathlon winter with 1,248 points.
The current season is marked by a duel with Johannes Thingnes Bö. The Norwegian has already triumphed eight times. Despite an outstanding gust of wind, however, Martin Fourcade is back in the yellow jersey. At the moment he defends an unbelievable series of 18 (!) consecutive podium places across the seasons.
He is not allowed to ride (as an athlete), she is right in the middle of it. At the Olympic Games in Pyeongchang, the Björndalen family is separated. While the 44-year-old old champion from Norway missed the qualification for his seventh Olympic Games, his wife is once again one of the top favourites on gold.
Darja Domracheva has been reminiscent of the great Norwegian since her World Cup start in Östersund in Sweden in 2006: her running style is similar to that of the great Norwegian. Hardly any other biathlete glides through the snow as elegantly as the Belarussian. At the 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi, everything fit. In pursuit, singles and mass start Domracheva won gold and thus became one of the most successful athletes of the games and a popular heroine in Belarus.
In 2015/16, Domracheva was hit hard: with Pfeifferschem glandular fever, she missed almost the entire season. Other things came to the fore before she took a break because of pregnancy. But only four months after the birth of her daughter, she won silver in the pursuit at the Biathlon World Championships in Hochfilzen, shortly afterwards she won the World Cup again.
In Pyeongchang, too, the Belarussian woman can be trusted to do a lot again. In Hochfilzen she won the sprint, in Antholz the mass start dress rehearsal before the Olympics. Darja Domracheva can hold up the flag of the Björndalen family in South Korea.
Page 1: Biathlon with Martin Fourcade and Darja Domracheva
Page 2: Ski Jumping with Simon Ammann and Kamil Stoch
Page 3: Alpine Skiing with Marcel Hirscher, Mikaela Shiffrin and Lindsey Vonn
Page 4: Snowboard with Shaun White