At the end of last winter, JT Boe, usually shy about big plans for a champion of his caliber, announced a target for 2024/2025: to equal Ole Einar Bjoerndalen's six Total Score wins. But much more is in store for the world's most successful biathlete. And not only for him.

TOTAL SCORE

JT Boe vs Bjoerndalen - Part 1

JT Boe won his first BMW IBU World Cup title in 2018/2019. It marked a series of five wins in six seasons, with only Quentin Fillon Maillet breaking Johannes's series in the Olympic 2021/2022 season. Boe now eyes a new milestone in his fabulously successful career—winning his sixth Total Score title in the coming winter that would equal him with Ole Einar Bjoerndalen, the man he called The King of Biathlon on many occasions. Should he withstand the attacks of his brother Tarjei and other highly motivated teammates, Swedes, French, and perhaps Tommaso Giacomel, whose ambitions are grand, Johannes would edge closer to the record of seven Total Score wins by Martin Fourcade. His great French rival, whose ghost lurked beneath Johannes's bed - as he put it in the first season after Fourcade's retirement at the end of 2018/2019 -while the Norwegian dreamt of the next epic battle.

One record will remain intact: Fourcade won the Total Score and all four individual Discipline scores four times (2012/2013, 2015/2016, 2016/2017, 2017/2018. JT Boe achieved the same feat in 2018/2019.

Vittozzi and Simon can move higher in the World Cup history books

Lisa Vittozzi and Julia Simon are the only still-active women athletes with a Total Score win. Should either of them add a new title to their career balance sheet, they would join two-time Total Score winners Eva Karpela, Anfisa Retzsova, Tora Berger, and Dorothea Wierer. Kaisa Makarainen and Magdalena Neuner, with three triumphs, will remain joint second in the Total Score history. Magdalena Forsberg's run of six consecutive titles remains an effort out of this world.

WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS MEDALS

JT Boe vs Bjoerndalen - Part 2

In Nove Mesto 2024, JT Boe became the first athlete who won 7/7 medals at two consecutive World Championships. His tally before Lenzerheide 2025 is 38 medals - 20 are golds. Compare this to Ole Einar Bjoerndalen and his 45 medals, of which 20 are also golds, and you can sense that Boe will shatter another record. Should he do a triple 7/7 in Switzerland, he would also tie 45 medals from Bjoerndalen.

Hanna Oeberg and Vittozzi can make big moves

Hanna Oeberg (13 medals) and Lisa Vittozzi (12 medals) could achieve significant rankings moves among all-time women leaders should their performances at Lenzerheide be victorious. Uschi Disl is atop the World Championships historical books with 19 medals. Knowing that Vittozzi won back-to-back four medals in Oberhof and Nove Mesto and that she seems to have just hit her career prime in the last seasons, the odds look good for the Italian to swoosh past Tiril Eckhoff (15 medals) and perhaps equal Marte Olsbu Roeiseland (17 medals). As for Oeberg - she is not too keen on the high-altitude venues but is a proven big-time performer.

WORLD CUP WINS

JT Boe vs Bjoerndalen - Part 3

JT Boe is also on the cusp of becoming the man with the most wins in the World Cup (taking into account individual and relay competitions). He amassed 102 World Cup wins to Ole Einar Bjoerndalen's 108 before the 2024/2025 season. Boe won 13 times last winter and an incredible 20 times in the 2022/2023 season. He has won 13 times per season on average since 2018/2019 - the odds for Boe to become an all-time leader after the coming winter look pretty strong.

As for the individual wins count, Bjoerndalen has 95 to his name and Boe 85. They both won 8 times in the Individual; Boe won 37 Sprints to Bjoerndalen's 36 and 16 Mass Starts to Bjoerndalen's 14. Bjoerdalen's edge is in the Pursuit - he won 37 and Boe 24.