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FORT KENT – Uschi Disl had a big smile on her face when she skied away from the first round of shooting during the 7.5-kilometer sprint event at the World Cup Biathlon Wednesday morning, and for good reason.
Germany’s Disl, who is known on the Cup tour for moments of spotty shooting, had just fired off a perfect 5-for-5 round in the prone shooting portion of the race. Minutes later she would again hit all five targets in the standing portion.
Perfect shooting – 100 percent in biathlon-talk – and a speedy final lap would propel her to a win as the competition opened at the Maine Winter Sports Center’s 10th Mountain Division Lodge in front of thousands of flag-waving, cowbell-ringing spectators.
The four-day competition, which is the ninth and second-to-last stop on the World Cup tour, is being held here for the first time.
Disl finished in a time of 21 minutes, 27.2 seconds. Her shooting was especially critical as overall Cup standings leader Liv Grete Poiree of Norway countered with a 100 percent day of her own but faltered on her skis.
Poiree finished in second place, 21.8 seconds behind Disl, but that may have been enough to solidify the overall Cup championship. She’s currently first with 809 points. Russia’s Olga Pyleva, who was fifth Wednesday, is in second place overall and Sandrine Bailly of France, the 17th-place finisher, is third.
Olga Zaitseva of Russia also had a perfect day on the range and finished in third place with a time of 23:00.4. She sits in 12th place in the standings.
Disl is currently in sixth place in the Cup standings.
In the sprint event, racers start at 40-second intervals and complete three ski loops and two shooting stages. Athletes have to hit five targets; for each target missed they must complete an extra 150-meter penalty loop, which typically takes 20-25 seconds.
Rachel Steer of Anchorage, Alaska, was the top U.S. finisher with a 33rd-place finish. She had a time of 24:41.9 with two penalties.
Wednesday’s finish was a bit disappointing for Steer, who had a clean race in the sprint at last Friday’s Cup stop in Lake Placid, N.Y., and finished 16th overall in that event.
“It’s always hard when you have the weekend of your life the last weekend,” said Steer, who is 39th in the overall standings. “You have high expectations. And that made it difficult to come into the race today. I put a lot of pressure on myself. With two penalties, for me, 80 percent is not good shooting on any day, let alone after last weekend. I’m not as strong of a skier as some of these girls, so I need to be clean.”
Steer expressed surprise with Disl’s results on the range. The eight-time Olympic medal winner logged three penalties in the Lake Placid sprint.
“I know that I can shoot,” Disl said, feigning indignation. “… It’s not only in practice that I shoot well.”
But with the top three finishers shooting well, Disl needed a better day on her skis.
Poiree had a two-second lead on Disl after Poiree completed the prone shooting stage but lost time in the second loop and was 13.7 seconds behind the German. She fell twice on the course, once when she got crossed up with a Japanese skier, and was well behind as she entered the final lap.
Poiree recovered in the final loop and was two-tenths of a second off her 6:33.6 pace in the first loop, but Disl’s blistering 6:25.3 in her final circuit was too much for Poiree to overcome.
Poiree said she tried not to let the times on the stadium’s scoreboard bother her.
“I had to be concerned [with] myself,” said Poiree, who is the wife of men’s World Cup points leader Raphael Poiree of France.
Jill Krause Beste, who trains in Underhill, Vt., finished 51st and Yarmouth’s Sara Granroth was 53rd.
Beste had three penalties, a solid day on the range.
“I missed three, which is not that good but it’s better for me,” she said.
In a rare mishap, German biathlete Katja Beer’s rifle broke when she fell on the course. But each country has one reserve rifle for use by any member of the team, and each athlete practices with the rifle before the competition starts. U.S. Biathlon press officer Jerry Kokesh said it’s the first time that has happened during the World Cup season.
Beer likely lost about 10 seconds of time and finished 54th overall.
The World Cup events continue Thursday at 9:30 a.m. with the men’s 10-kilometer sprint.
Biathlon
WORLD CUP
At Fort Kent
Wednesday
(Missed targets are in parentheses)
Women
7.5K Sprint
1. Uschi Disl, Germany, 21:27.2 (0).
2. Liv Grete Poiree, Norway, 21:49.0 (0).
3. Olga Zaitseva, Russia, 23:00.4 (0).
4. Simone Denkinger, Germany, 23:01.5 (1).
5. Olga Pyleva, Russia, 23:03.5 (2).
6. Ekaterina Dafovska, Bulgaria, 23:19.5 (2).
7. Katrin Apel, Germany, 23:20.0 (2).
8. Albina Akhatova, Russia, 23:20.8 (1).
9. Michela Ponza, Italy, 23:25.9 (0).
10. Kati Wilhelm, Germany, 23:26.0 (1).
World Cup Standings
(After 22-of-27 Competitions)
1. Liv Grete Poiree, Norway, 809 points.
2. Olga Pyleva, Russia, 694.
3. Sandrine Bailly, France, 658.
4. Martina Glagow, Germany, 606.
5. Anna Bogali, Russia, 604.
6. Uschi Disl, Germany, 603.
7. Katrin Apel, Germany, 545.
8. Olena Zubrilova, Belarus, 507.
9. Kati Wilhelm, Germany, 442.
10. Gunn Margit Andreassen, Norway, 424.
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