Biathlon

Biathlon is a term used to describe any sporting event made up of two disciplines. However, biathlon usually refers specifically to the winter sport that combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. Other popular variants include summer biathlon, which combines cross-country running with riflery, modern biathlon and biathle, which combine running with swimming.

Concise history
The sport has its origins in an exercise for Norwegian soldiers, as an alternative training for the military. The world's first known ski club, the Trysil Rifle and Ski Club, was formed in Norway in 1861 to promote national defense at the local level.

Called military patrol, the combination of skiing and shooting was contested at the Olympic Winter Games in 1924, and then demonstrated in 1928, 1936, and 1948, but did not regain Olympic recognition then, as the small number of competing countries disagreed on the rules (see also Governing body, below). During the mid-1950s, however, biathlon was introduced into the Soviet and Swedish winter sport circuits and was widely enjoyed by the public. This newfound popularity aided the effort of having biathlon gain entry into the Winter Olympics.

The first World Championship in biathlon was held in 1958 in Austria, and in 1960 the sport was finally included in the Olympic Games. At Albertville in 1992, women were first allowed in Olympic biathlon.

The competitions from 1958 to 1965 used high-power centerfire such as .30-06 Springfield and 7.62x51mm NATO, and so on, before the .22 Long Rifle rimfire cartridge was standardized in 1978. The ammunition was carried in a belt worn around the competitor's waist. The sole event was the men's 20 km individual, encompassing four separate ranges and firing distances of 100 m, 150 m, 200 m, and 250 m. The target distance was reduced to 150 m with the addition of the relay in 1966. The shooting range was further reduced to 50 m in 1978 with the mechanical targets making their debut at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid.

Governing body
In 1948, the Union Internationale de Pentathlon Moderne et Biathlon (UIPMB) was founded, to standardise the rules for biathlon and modern pentathlon. In 1993, the biathlon branch of the UIPMB created the International Biathlon Union (IBU), which officially separated from the UIPMB in 1998.

Presidents of the UIPMB/IBU:
 * 1947–1949: Tom Wiborn (Sweden)
 * 1949–1960: Gustaf Dyrssen (Sweden)
 * 1960–1988: Sven Thofelt, (Sweden)
 * 1988–1992: Igor Novikov (USSR/Russia)
 * Since 1992: Anders Besseberg (Norway)

Championships
The following articles list major international biathlon events and medalists. Contrary to the Olympics and World Championships (BWCH), the World Cup (BWC) is an entire winter season of (mostly) weekly races, where the medalists are those with the highest sums of World Cup points at the end of the season.
 * Biathlon at the Olympic Games
 * Biathlon World Championships
 * Biathlon World Cup
 * Biathlon Junior World Championships

Rules and equipment


The complete rules of biathlon are given in the official IBU rule book (see External links, below).

Basic concepts
A biathlon competition consists of a race in which contestants ski around a cross-country track, and where the total distance is broken up by either two or four shooting rounds, half in prone position, the other half standing. Depending on the shooting performance, extra distance or time is added to the contestant's total running distance/time. As in most races, the contestant with the shortest total time wins.

For each shooting round, the biathlete must hit five targets; each missed target must be "atoned for" in one of three ways, depending on the competition format:
 * by skiing around a 150 m penalty loop, typically taking 20–30 seconds for top-level biathletes to complete (running time depending on weather/snow conditions),
 * by having one minute added to a skier's total time, or
 * by having to use an "extra cartridge" (placed at the shooting range) to finish off the target; only three such "extras" are available for each round, and a penalty loop must be made for each of the targets left standing.

In order to keep track of the contestants' progress and relative standing throughout a race, split times (intermediate times) are taken at several points along the skiing track and upon finishing each shooting round. The large display screens commonly set up at biathlon arenas, as well as the information graphics shown as part of the TV picture, will typically list the split time of the fastest contestant at each intermediate point and the times and time differences to the closest runners-up.

Skiing details
All cross-country skiing techniques are permitted in biathlon, which means that the free technique is usually the preferred one, being the fastest. No equipment other than skis and ski poles may be used to move along the track. Minimum ski length is 4 cm less than the height of the skier. The rifle has to be carried by the skier during the race at all times.

Shooting details
The biathlete carries the small bore rifle, which weighs at least 3.5 kg, including ammunition in magazines on his/her back during the race. The rifles use .22 LR ammunition and are bolt action or Fortner (straight-pull bolt) action.

The target range shooting distance is 50 m. There are five circular targets to be hit in each shooting round. When shooting in the prone position the target diameter is 45 mm, when shooting in the standing position the target diameter is 115 mm. On all modern biathlon ranges, the targets are self-indicating, in that they flip from black to white when hit, giving the biathlete as well as the spectators instant visual feedback for each shot fired.

Individual
The 20 km individual race (15 km for women) is the oldest biathlon event; the distance is skied over five laps. The biathlete shoots four times at any shooting lane, in the order of prone, standing, prone, standing, totaling 20 targets. For each missed target a fixed penalty time, usually one minute, is added to the skiing time of the biathlete. Competitors' starts are staggered, normally by 30 seconds.

Sprint
The sprint is 10 km for men and 7.5 km for women; the distance is skied over three laps. The biathlete shoots twice at any shooting lane, once prone and once standing, for a total of 10 shots. For each miss, a penalty loop of 150 metres must be skied before the race can be continued. As in the individual competition, the biathletes start in intervals.

Pursuit
In a pursuit, biathletes' starts are separated by their time differences from a previous race, most commonly a sprint. The contestant crossing the finish line first is the winner. The distance is 12.5 km for men and 10 km for women, skied over five laps; there are four shooting bouts (two prone, two standing, in that order), and each miss means a penalty loop of 150 m. To prevent awkward and/or dangerous crowding of the skiing loops, and overcapacity at the shooting range, World Cup Pursuits are held with only the 60 top ranking biathletes after the preceding race. The biathletes shoot on a first-come, first-served basis at the lane corresponding to the position they arrived for all shooting bouts.

Mass start
In the mass start, all biathletes start at the same time and the first across the finish line wins. In this 15 km or 12.5 km for women competition, the distance is skied over five laps; there are four bouts of shooting (two prone, two standing, in that order) with the first shooting bout being at the lane corresponding to your bib (Bib #10 shoots at lane #10 regardless of position in race.) with rest of the shooting bouts being at the lane in the position they arrived (Arrive at the lane in fifth place, you shoot at lane five.). As in sprint races, competitors must ski one 150 m penalty loop for each miss. Here again, to avoid unwanted congestion, World Cup Mass starts are held with only the 30 top ranking athletes on the start line (half that of the Pursuit as here all contestants start simultaneously).

Relay
The relay teams consist of four biathletes, who each ski 7.5 km (men) or 6 km (women), each leg skied over three laps, with two shooting rounds; one prone, one standing. For every round of five targets there are eight bullets available, though the last three can only be single-loaded manually one at a time from spare round holders or bullets deposited by the competitor into trays or onto the mat at the firing line. If after eight bullets there are still misses, one 150 m penalty loop must be taken for each missed target remaining. The first-leg participants start all at the same time, and as in cross-country skiing relays, every athlete of a team must touch the team's next-leg participant to perform a valid changeover. On the first shooting stage of the first leg, the participant must shoot in the lane corresponding to their bib number (Bib #10 shoots at lane #10 regardless of position in race.), then for the remainder of the relay, the relay team shoots at the lane in the position they arrived (Arrive at the range in 5th place, you shoot at lane five.).

Mixed relay
The most recent addition to the number of biathlon competition variants, the mixed relay, is similar to the ordinary relay but for the composition of the teams, each of which consists of two women and two men. Legs 1 and 2 are done by the women, legs 3 and 4 by the men. The women's legs are 6 km and men's legs are 7.5 km as in ordinary relay competitions.

Team (obsolete)
A team consists of four biathletes, but unlike the relay competition, all team members start at the same time. Two athletes must shoot in the prone shooting round, the other two in the standing round. In case of a miss, the two non-shooting biathletes must ski a penalty loop of 150 m. The skiers must enter the shooting area together, and must also finish within 15 seconds of each other; otherwise a time penalty of one minute is added to the total time. Since 2004, this race format has been obsolete at the World Cup level.

Biathlon venues
World Cup events and World Championships in biathlon have traditionally been held at the following few locations. Due to the complicated shooting range equipment, which absolutely has to work in order to hold successful races, biathlon is a highly demanding sport for organisers.


 * * Since 2002, the Veltins-Arena in Gelsenkirchen has hosted a special mixed team event once a year, now called the "Veltins Biathlon World Team Challenge".

Broadcasting
Biathlon events are broadcast most regularly where the sport enjoys its greatest popularity, namely Germany (ARD, ZDF), Austria (ORF), Norway (NRK), Finland (YLE), Estonia (ETV), Latvia (LTV), Croatia (HRT), Poland (TVP), Sweden (SVT), Russia (Russia 2, Channel One (Russia)), Belarus (TVR), Slovenia (RTV), Bosnia and Herzegovina (BHRT), Bulgaria (BNT), South Korea (KBS); it is broadcast on European-wide Eurosport, which also broadcasts to the Asia-Pacific region. World Cup races are streamed (without commentary) via the IBU website and some of these events are available on the World Championship Sports Network (WCSN).

The broadcast distribution being one indicator, the constellation of a sport's main sponsors usually gives a similar, and correlated, indication of popularity: for biathlon, these are the Germany-based companies E.ON Ruhrgas (energy), Krombacher (beer), and Viessmann (boilers and other heating systems).

Biathlon variants
Two common variations on traditional winter biathlon are summer biathlon, where skiing is replaced by a cross-country run, and archery biathlon (or ski archery), where the rifle is replaced by a recurve bow.

There have also been summer competitions in roller-ski biathlon, mountain bike biathlon and orienteering biathlon. Primitive Biathlon uses snowshoes and muzzleloaders.

The Boy Scouts of America offers a Bikeathlon variant at their national Scout jamboree that mixes BMX biking with air rifle shooting at biathlon type targets.

Cadets Canada also offers biathlon to cadets across Canada, with three stages; zones, provincial and national. Zone competitions are occasionally, due to lack of snow in some southern areas, held as summer biathlon. A .22LR caliber rifle is used at all levels. Races are shorter than world class events. More information can be found at the National Cadet Biathlon Championship website.

The World Police and Fire Games, as well as the Western States Police and Fire Games (USA), offer a summer variant which combines cross-country running with service pistol shooting.