JT Boe and Sturla Holm Laegreid intensified their battle for the Total Score title, Tiril Eckhoff simply kept on winning, the German men won the relay after a four-year wait with almost the same lineup that they had in Antholz 2017, a shuffled lineup brought the first-ever relay Total Score title to the Swedish women and France and its junior superstar dominated at the IBU Youth/Junior World Championships in Obertilliach, Austria.

• JT Boe and Sturla Holm Laegreid have equal chances for the Total Score winJ

JT Boe and his teammate Sturla Holm Laegreid are in the final phases of the big battle for the Total Score win, in which every missed or closed target matters; Sturla was fourth in the sprint and fifth in the pursuit while JT finished only 11th in the sprint (his worst performance of the season) and bounced back strongly after two initial misses in the pursuit to finish second, behind his brother Tarjei. With five individual competitions to go before the end of the season, JT has 955 points and Sturla 922; when we take away the four worst results, JT has 826 points to Sturla’s 824. JT is in phenomenal skiing form and Sturla, although he is admittedly emotionally tired after the many highs at the IBU World Championships 2021 in Pokljuka, is keeping his shooting accuracy at 90% (or higher). The stakes couldn't be higher for both athletes and they will both use the next three competition-free days to further recharge their batteries and work on details.

• Everything is falling into place for Tiril Eckhoff

Tiril Eckhoff added two impressive and barely-challenged individual wins in the first week of Nove Mesto na Morave. She now has 10 wins going into the last five individual competitions of the season. Almost everybody else is digging deep to find their last reserves of energy or to rebound from the long build-up to the IBU World Championships Pokljuka 2021 and all its emotional drama, but Eckhoff seems to be simply cruising through what is increasingly turning out to be one of the finest women’s seasons ever. She has won five sprints and five pursuits for a Total Score win in both disciplines already; she has been winning 51.5 points per competition (discounting the four worst results) and this average could rise further by the end of the season. While the Total Score Standings battle is not over yet, Eckhoff is in a very good position to be crowned at the end of the season.

• A shuffled lineup wins Sweden its first-ever women’s relay globe

With team leader Hanna Oeberg open to suggestions, Swedish coach Johannes Lukas mixed up the usual lineup, putting Mona Brorsson back on the team and in the opening leg, Hanna in second, the rock-solid Linn Persson in third and Elvira Oeberg, renowned as a strong finisher, as the anchor. There were many possible outcomes before the last relay of the season - with four out of six counting for the Total Score win in the relay - and it was the Swedish team that kept their nerves together while France and Norway skied one penalty loop each and Germany, the Total Score leader before the final competition, was far too slow on the tracks. Just like Germany, Sweden finished with 216 points, but it had two wins to Germany’s one. France finished third with 204 points.

• The German men waited for four years and 22 competitions to win the relay again

Erik Lesser, Benedikt Doll and Arnd Peiffer were anchored by recent biathlon retiree Simon Schempp when they won the men’s relay on 21 January 2017 in Antholz–Anterselva. They needed four years and 22 competitions, as well as the unexpected company of Philipp Nawrath as their anchor, to win again and it all happened in the first week of Nove Mesto na Morave. Lesser didn’t remember much about the Antholz win, Doll saw it as a very special occasion because it was his first win for Germany.

Peiffer knew that Schempp beat Emil Hegle Svendsen in a very close finish because Germany won by a mere margin of 0.1 seconds and Nawrath was amazed that he got the anchor role and was than amazingly cool in his final-act execution of a brilliant team performance. Germany left all the other relay teams in the dust, beating second place Russia by 1:21.7 and third place Norway by 1:33.2.

• France dominates IBU Y/J World Championships Obertilliach 2021

France ended a highly successful IBU Youth/Junior World Championships in Obertilliach as (by far) the most decorated nation by winning 11 medals; seven of them were gold. Italy won 10 medals, which shows great new depth in their talent pool. Five of their medals were silver and five bronze. Emilien Claude was the absolute star of Obertilliach, for he won a gold medal in the sprint and in the pursuit, anchored the French relay team to a win and won a bronze in the individual. His was a beautiful story about more than just sport, as was the story of Amy Baserga of Switzerland, who won gold in the sprint and in the pursuit. Lena Repinc of Slovenia won all four available medals in the youth women competitions, winning in the sprint and in the pursuit and coming in second in the individual and in the youth women’s relay. Denis Irodov of Russia dominated the youth men’s field, winning gold medals in all three individual competitions while shooting a combined 49/50. This was also the first time in the history of the IBU Youth/Junior World Championships that all four youth and junior winners in the sprint followed up with another gold medal in the pursuit.

Photo: IBU/Christian Manzoni