Who better than Johannes Boe to close the Biathlon World Championships in Nove Mesto, Czech Republic in style? The Norwegian, already crowned in the pursuit and the individual, won gold again on Sunday February 18, by winning the mass start, the premier event. Two years to the day after winning the Olympic title at the Beijing Games.
At the finish, he was ahead of Latvian Andrejs Rastorgujevs, second, and Frenchman Quentin Fillon-Maillet, third. The latter offers the French delegation its 13th medal of these Worlds, the only one in an individual race for men.
Reserved for the thirty best biathletes of the season, the mass start is the second longest event on the circuit: the competitors set off simultaneously for a 15 km course (12.5 km for women), i.e. five loops and four passages behind the rifle, for two shots lying down then two shots standing up.
Quentin Fillon Maillet had a perfect start to the race, taking the lead halfway through. But he made a mistake on the first standing shot. Johannes Boe, author of a single foul during the first prone shot, took advantage of the Frenchman’s passage through the penalty ring to gain ground and secure a new coronation.
Bjoerndalen’s records in the viewfinder
Like last year at Oberhof in Germany, Johannes Boe ends his fortnight with seven podiums in seven events contested – but two titles less. Above all, he writes his name a little more in the annals of his sport. On Sunday, he signed his 20th success in the world championships, equaling the record of his legendary compatriot Ole Einar Bjoerndalen – even if in his time there was no single mixed relay, which Johannes Boe won three times in his career.
The reference of the eleven individual world titles, which Ole Einar Bjoerndalen co-holds with the Frenchman Martin Fourcade, will however hold until the next edition of the Worlds, in 2025 in Lenzerheide, in the Swiss Graubünden. The 30-year-old Norwegian has, for the moment, “only” ten. He will also have to wait to overtake his illustrious elder in the total number of world medals: Johannes Boe won his 38th on Sunday (20 in gold, 13 in silver, 5 in bronze), while “the Cannibal” totals 45 (20 in gold , 14 in silver, 11 in bronze).
