Biathlon World Cup continued on Saturday at Holmenkollen.
Johannes Bö was able to win again. Stock photo. EPA / AOP
Having already secured the victory in the overall World Cup competition Johannes Bö won the men’s 12.5 km pursuit race in Holmenkollen on Saturday in show style.
The man was in such an overwhelming lead at the last shooting location that he decided to put on a show. When the first four boards had clicked down, Bö stopped shooting. He looked out into the audience and raised his index finger to his lips.
– This has never been seen before, giving a signal to the audience in the middle of a series to be quiet, Yle’s expert Kaisa Mäkäräinen amazed.
Although the trick can be considered really arrogant, Bö could afford it, and even the last board clicked down. Mäkäräinen admired the man’s self-confidence.
– It would have been embarrassing to shoot past, the woman laughed.
Bö started the race first, and didn’t lose his top spot at any point, even though the man fooled around and vented in the middle of the race and even shot one bomb.
The 24-second lead at the start even grew so that at the finish line the difference to France, who came second Quentin Fillon Maillet was 32.7 seconds. Norwegian Sturla Lägreid (+49.1) was third.
Tero Seppälä was handsomely 11th as the best Finn in the race. He started in 22nd place. Seppälä missed a couple of ticks off the board. The difference to the top was 1:28.8.
Otto Invenius dropped ten places and was 22nd in the final results. Olli Hiidensalo was the 30th and Jaakko Ranta 54:s.
On the men’s side, the World Cup ends on Sunday with the 15 km joint start race.
The women start at 16:00 in the sprint race, which measures 7.5 kilometers. The women’s season ends like the men’s on Sunday in Kollen with a joint start race (12.5 kilometers).
Tero Seppälä made a handsome climb in Saturday’s pursuit. Stock photo. PASI LEISMA