Biathlon World Championships 2011

The 44th Biathlon World Championships was held in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia from March 3–13, 2011.

There was a total of 11 competitions: sprint, pursuit, individual, mass start, and relay races for men and women, and mixed relay. All the events during this championships also counted for the 2010–11 Biathlon World Cup season.

Championship highlights

The Championships kicked off with the Mixed relay event which is seeking to make its way onto the Olympic programme for the 2014 games in Sochi. As the first event of the programme, it was finally given importance by the different teams, with all nations fielding their best teams, in difference to earlier world cup events. The Norwegians won it, overtaking Germany on the last leg. The veteran Ole Einar Bjørndalen won his fifteenth world championship gold medal in the process and his first in the mixed relay, giving him a full set of gold medals in the six events that are currently contested.^[1]

Tarjei Bø, Martin Fourcade, Kaisa Mäkäräinen and Arnd Peiffer won their first champion titles in career. Martin Fourcade also won a full scope of medals, gold, silver and bronze at these championships.

The surprise medalists included Maxim Maximov of Russia, Tina Bachmann of Germany and Vita Semerenko of Ukraine.

Helena Ekholm literally swept the field in the individual with zero shooting and fast skiing, winning more than 2 minutes over the runner-up Bachmann and making one of the greatest 1–2 place margins in biathlon history.

Schedule of events

Biathlon World Championships 2011
Individual		men		women
Sprint		men		women
Pursuit		men		women
Mass start		men		women
Relay		men	mixed	women

The provisional timeschedule of the event stands below. All times in UTC+5.

Medal winners

Men

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
20 km individual	Tarjei Bø  Norway	48:29.9 (0+0+1+0)	Maxim Maksimov  Russia	49:09.9 (0+0+0+0)	Christoph Sumann  Austria	49:15.4 (0+0+0+1)
10 km sprint	Arnd Peiffer  Germany	24:34.0 (0+1)	Martin Fourcade  France	24:47.0 (2+0)	Tarjei Bø  Norway	24:59.2 (1+0)
12.5 km pursuit	Martin Fourcade  France	33:02.6 (0+1+2+0)	Emil Hegle Svendsen  Norway	33:06.4 (0+0+1+1)	Tarjei Bø  Norway	33:07.8 (0+0+1+1)
15 km mass start	Emil Hegle Svendsen  Norway	38:42.7 (0+0+0+1)	Evgeny Ustyugov  Russia	38:47.7 (0+0+0+0)	Lukas Hofer  Italy	38:57.0 (0+0+0+1)
4 × 7.5 km relay	Norway Ole Einar Bjørndalen Alexander Os Emil Hegle Svendsen Tarjei Bø	1:16:13.5	Russia Anton Shipulin Evgeny Ustyugov Maxim Maksimov Ivan Tcherezov	1:16:26.9	Ukraine Olexander Bilanenko Andriy Deryzemlya Serhiy Semenov Serguei Sednev	1:16:41.5

Women

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
15 km individual	Helena Ekholm  Sweden	47:08.3 (0+0+0+0)	Tina Bachmann  Germany	49:24.1 (0+2+0+0)	Vita Semerenko  Ukraine	50:00.4 (1+0+0+2)
7.5 km sprint	Magdalena Neuner  Germany	20:31.2 (0+0)	Kaisa Mäkäräinen  Finland	20:43.4 (0+0)	Anastasiya Kuzmina  Slovakia	21:11.2 (0+1)
10 km pursuit	Kaisa Mäkäräinen  Finland	30:00.1 (0+0+0+0)	Magdalena Neuner  Germany	30:21.7 (0+0+0+2)	Helena Ekholm  Sweden	31:43.7 (0+0+0+0)
12.5 km mass start	Magdalena Neuner  Germany	36:48.5 (0+1+2+1)	Darya Domracheva  Belarus	36:53.3 (2+1+0+0)	Tora Berger  Norway	37:02.5 (2+1+0+0)
4 × 6 km relay	Germany Andrea Henkel Miriam Gössner Tina Bachmann Magdalena Neuner	1:13:31.1	France[1] Anais Bescond Marie-Laure Brunet Sophie Boilley Marie Dorin	1:14:18.3	Belarus Nadezhda Skardino Darya Domracheva Nadzeya Pisareva Liudmila Kalinchik	1:15:18.5

1. ^ Ukraine initially finished 2nd with the time 1:13:55.6, but was later disqualified because Oksana Khvostenko – who did the final leg for Ukraine – had too high levels of ephedrine in a doping test. France thus gets the Silver instead of the Bronze medal which now goes to Belarus.^[2]

Mixed

Event	Gold		Silver		Bronze
2 × 6 km + 2 × 7.5 km relay	Norway Tora Berger Ann Kristin Aafedt Flatland Ole Einar Bjørndalen Tarjei Bø	1:14:22.5	Germany Andrea Henkel Magdalena Neuner Arnd Peiffer Michael Greis	1:14:45.4	France Marie-Laure Brunet Marie Dorin Alexis Bœuf Martin Fourcade	1:15:38.7

Medal table

Top nations

Rank	Nation	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Germany	4	3	0	7
2	Norway	4	1	3	8
3	France	1	2	1	4
4	Finland	1	1	0	2
5	Sweden	1	0	1	2
6	Russia	0	3	0	3
7	Belarus	0	1	1	2
8	Ukraine	0	0	2	2
9	Slovakia	0	0	1	1
	Austria	0	0	1	1
	Italy	0	0	1	1
Total		11	11	11	33

Top athletes

All athletes with two or more medals.

Rank	Biathlete	Gold	Silver	Bronze	Total
1	Magdalena Neuner (GER)	3	2	0	5
2	Tarjei Bø (NOR)	3	0	2	5
3	Emil Hegle Svendsen (NOR)	2	1	0	3
4	Ole Einar Bjørndalen (NOR)	2	0	0	2
5	Martin Fourcade (FRA)	1	1	1	3
6	Kaisa Mäkäräinen (FIN)	1	1	0	2
	Arnd Peiffer (GER)	1	1	0	2
	Tina Bachmann (GER)	1	1	0	2
	Andrea Henkel (GER)	1	1	0	2
10	Tora Berger (NOR)	1	0	1	2
	Helena Ekholm (SWE)	1	0	1	2
12	Maxim Maksimov (RUS)	0	2	0	2
	Evgeny Ustyugov (RUS)	0	2	0	2
14	Marie Dorin (FRA)	0	1	1	2
	Marie-Laure Brunet (FRA)	0	1	1	2
	Darya Domracheva (BLR)	0	1	1	2

Participating countries

40 nations will compete.^[3]

See also

• 2011 IPC Biathlon and Cross-Country Skiing World Championships

References

External links

• Media related to 2011 Biathlon World Championships at Wikimedia Commons
• Biathlon World Championships 2011 official site (English)

Biathlon World Championships
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