The corona virus is slowing down the next biathlon star: Sebastian Samuelsson has to take a forced break due to an infection.
“After waking up this morning with cold symptoms, I tested positive for Covid,” Samuelsson said on Instagram: “I will not be starting the sprint here in Lenzerheide.”
The Biathlon World Cup will stop in Switzerland from the end of this week. Samuelsson is one of the best athletes so far this season. The reigning mass start world champion is currently in second place in the overall ranking with 281 points. Only the Norwegian Tarjei Bø (290) is ahead of the 26-year-old. The failure comes at an extremely unfortunate time for Samuelsson.
It is currently uncertain whether the Swede will still be able to compete in Lenzerheide. After the pursuit on Saturday, the final mass start is scheduled for Sunday. After that, things won’t continue until the new year in Oberhof.
Corona virus stops biathlon stars
The corona virus is currently thwarting the plans of several biathlon stars. Among the women, France’s Lou Jeanmonnot and Norway’s Marthe Kråkstad Johansen are missing.
Franziska Preuß from the German team was most recently affected. The 29-year-old therefore had to cancel the previous races in Hochfilzen and was therefore unable to go to the cross-country ski trail or to the shooting range in the yellow jersey.
“It’s a big challenge because you have to protect yourself in a world in which nobody is really careful anymore,” Germany’s biathlon sports director Felix Bitterling recently told the “German Press Agency” at the World Cup in Austria: “We’re trying to protect ourselves to isolate yourself and have hardly any contact with the outside world, but there are always situations in which outside contact is there.”