At the end of the World Cup in Hochfilzen, Austria, the German biathletes missed out on the sense of success they had longed for in the relay.
In an unusual line-up, Justus Strelow, Simon Kaiser, Danilo Riethmüller and Philipp Nawrath couldn’t get past fifth place after only finishing fourth at the season opener in Kontiolahti.
After 13 spare rounds and one penalty lap by Riethmüller, the DSV quartet was 2:27.8 minutes behind the victorious French, who had already won the second relay race of the winter against the other dominators from Norway. The Swedes, who had been far behind for a long time, secured third place.
German biathletes are particularly unstable when shooting
Until Riethmüller’s standing stage, the Germans were safely in third place. But the 25-year-old, who already needed two extra cartridges while lying down, then had to run an additional 150 meters and fell back to fifth place. And Nawrath couldn’t do anything else either, barely avoiding another penalty in his last shooting.
This meant that national coach Uros Velepec’s protégés ended the second season of the season disappointingly. Nawrath was the strongest with two eighth places in the individual races.
But there wasn’t really a chance for the podium in the sprint and pursuit. The Norwegians around the dominant double winner Johannes Thingnes Bö and the French around Emilien Jacquelin looked much stronger at the start of the winter.