Course times:
1 Denise Herrmann 37'18,0
2 Marte Olsbu Røiseland +4,9
3 Tiril Eckhoff +7,8
4 Lisa Theresa Hauser +20,7
5 Dorothea Wierer +34,8
6 Katharina Innerhofer +41,6
7 Lisa Vittozzi +47,3
7= Julia Simon +47,3
9 Dzinara Alimbekava +50,3
10 Franziska Preuß +51,1
Real outlier for Lisa, though, before this season she'd set 9 top 20 course times, the pursuit in Kontiolahti earlier this season was her first top 10 although it's worth noting the frequency of top 20s had been improving over the last year or two. She normally settles lower end of the top 10 for ski time this season so this is an outlier. Innerhofer was also noticeably quick which could suggest good skis in the Austrian team as well, but she's typically in the 10-20 ski time area and erratic in the range. Historically she skis above her norm in Individuals, however, so she's probably better at dealing with the distance. The whole women's team has raised its game this year though.
Sure, but when we're judging the standards of biathletes as skiers we can only really judge their skate because they don't train for classic, and so in terms of judging them, we're better off going from the viewpoint of drafting them in as a ringer in a 15/10 free or on a skate relay leg, since those are where biathletes are most likely to be effective in cross-country, and where they have by and large been deployed in the past. Davidová's classic technique would not be of any more relevance than Razymová's shooting unless she chose to become an XC athlete full time because the Czechs would be insane to use her in Classic races unless it was an obligation thing to get her into the race she was targeting, like how you have to do the road race to enter the time trial in the Olympics. A bit like how some XC skiers are specialists in classic technique, or only enter distance races, or only enter sprints, biathletes could get some good results if deployed favourably.
Regards the French, this is precisely illustrating the point - all of the French biathletes mentioned would improve the current French XC team, and could score a decent haul of World Cup points, but not threaten more than the occasional bottom end top 10 if conditions fell right on the day or in one of those World Cups after the Tour de Ski or before a major championship where some of the elites don't compete. And rather than be a sport for failed XC skiers, these are skiers who would be among France's elites but are targeting biathlon; instead, recently, we've actually seen the French XC team attempting to replenish its number out of failed biathletes, which is an alarming sign.