Belgrade – The IBU Executive Board (EB) today approved the implementation of a new seeding system for Individual and Sprint competitions in the BMW IBU World Cup and World Championships Biathlon from the 2024/25 season onwards to ensure engaging competitions until the very end.

The decision was taken during the EB meeting in Belgrade ahead of the 16th Ordinary Congress. The main change in the new system is that the top athletes will start in designated start groups depending on their World Cup ranking rather than choosing their start group.

The new seeding system guarantees even more thrilling biathlon Sprint and Individual competitions and greater storytelling. The top 15 athletes of the current World Cup Total Score will start with bibs 46-75 and chase the best times towards the competition end. Fans watching on TV and in the stadia will have a greater event and viewer experience with the top athletes more spread out so their races can be followed more closely. Moreover, the best athletes from each country who are not in the Top 30 will open the competition delivering exciting competitions from the very start and throughout.

The IBU discussed the rule change with the IBU Athletes Committee, the IBU Technical Committee, several National Federations and teams. Based on their input, the EB has decided to run a test for the new start group system during the first four weeks of the World Cup in November and December 2024 and to evaluate the results. Moreover, in extraordinary weather situations causing severe course conditions, which won’t guarantee equally fair conditions across the start groups, the Competition Jury may decide to apply an alternative start group system, which provides for the top 15 athletes of the current World Cup Total Score to start at the beginning of the competition. The complete and detailed new system can be found here.

The EB also finalised the prize money structure for the World Cup season 2024/2025. Prize money available this winter was raised by seven percent compared to the previous season. Moreover, new prize money categories are introduced for the athlete with the best net pursuit time in Pursuit competitions and for the fastest athletes of each relay leg. This comes on top of the EB decision this summer, when it was decided that the same total prize money will be made available to athletes in the Olympic season as in a non-Olympic season by increasing the prize money for the World Cup, when there are no IBU World Championships. This means an additional 1.6 million Euro are paid out in the season 2025/2026.

The EB further approved IBU’s first ever Human Rights Policy to expressly acknowledge its responsibility to respect human rights across all its activities and to embed human rights into its governance.

Final planning for the Congress and the upcoming 2024/2025 season was discussed and the EB received reports from each of the IBU departments and the Biathlon Integrity Unit (BIU).