- Feb 20, 2010
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Germans back to winning ways in Oberhof, as Magdalena Neuner shakes off the rust from the relay and shoots clear to win. It's the usual suspects at the top - Domracheva 2nd, Zaitseva 3rd and Mäkäräinen 4th, Domracheva with 1 miss 37 seconds back, Mäki with 2 54 seconds back, Zaitseva in the middle 43 seconds back, but like Lena she shot clear. Andrea Henkel coming into some kind of form with 5th, but 1'20" back with only 1 miss - it's quite clear that there is quite some gap in ski speed between Neuner and the rest, with only a handful able to come close to her - Mäkäräinen, Solemdal, Domracheva and Berger the only ones to have really stood up against her ski speed all year. Even the tiny blonde express train that is Miri Gößner can't hold a torch to her, though Miri has had an absolutely terrible season so far; it seems she's sacrificed a lot of ski training to improve with the rifle, and really hasn't improved with it all that much, missing 4 targets today (though only one was from standing, so small mercies since Miriam Gößner taking on a standing shoot is biathlon's equivalent of Andrea Guardini taking on Monte Zoncolán).
Berger missed 3 targets; the rest of the top 10 is filled out by good shooting performances - Gregorin and the relatively unheralded pair of Dubarezava and Burdyga, followed by Rasimoviciute and another of the season's revelations, Olga Vilukhina. Bigger names cluster just outside the top 10 (Kuzmina, Sleptsova, Berger), whilst a disappointing day for France sees Marine Bolliet in 16th their unexpected top finisher after disappointment for Brunet (who actually shot the same as Bolliet but was outskied by the youngster) and Boilley (who looked to be doing well at the halfway stage, then missed 3 in the stand), and Marie Dorin in a catastrophic 71st after missing all 5 prone shots. Even worse for Sweden, with nobody in the top 30 at all - Ekholm in 31st after 3 misses, and worryingly for them, her sister Jenny continues to be a sharp shot, going clear, but continues to make zero progress whatsoever in her ski times, finishing 40th and being outskied by at least two people (Bachmann & Gößner) who missed no fewer than 4 shots; also being outskied by people like Fuyuko Suzuki and Yuliya Dzhyma (who?) can't be good for her confidence.
Berger missed 3 targets; the rest of the top 10 is filled out by good shooting performances - Gregorin and the relatively unheralded pair of Dubarezava and Burdyga, followed by Rasimoviciute and another of the season's revelations, Olga Vilukhina. Bigger names cluster just outside the top 10 (Kuzmina, Sleptsova, Berger), whilst a disappointing day for France sees Marine Bolliet in 16th their unexpected top finisher after disappointment for Brunet (who actually shot the same as Bolliet but was outskied by the youngster) and Boilley (who looked to be doing well at the halfway stage, then missed 3 in the stand), and Marie Dorin in a catastrophic 71st after missing all 5 prone shots. Even worse for Sweden, with nobody in the top 30 at all - Ekholm in 31st after 3 misses, and worryingly for them, her sister Jenny continues to be a sharp shot, going clear, but continues to make zero progress whatsoever in her ski times, finishing 40th and being outskied by at least two people (Bachmann & Gößner) who missed no fewer than 4 shots; also being outskied by people like Fuyuko Suzuki and Yuliya Dzhyma (who?) can't be good for her confidence.
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