Good Morning Everyone—or for those in Europe—close to Good Evening…

Before I forget, I really recommend you watch the two Mass Start races from Sunday, the finales of the Senior World Championships in Austria!! We only had 3 participating [Claire Egan was the 30th Woman after someone dropped out along with Susan Dunkley for the US Women and Lowell Bailey for the US Men]. But exciting races and another podium for the US!!

So this morning in the Youth and Junior Worlds, the Youth Men and Youth Women opened the competitions with 32 and 30 nations, respectively, participating in the Individual events with a 45 sec time penalty per miss. Fields of around 100 each.

In the Youth Men’s 12.5km Mass Start

Vasek Cervenka, Mt Itasca Biathlon,  went out with bib #20. He cleaned his first prone shooting and left the range in 1st of the 20 at that point in the race. He came back in 1st for standing, but missed 2, leaving the range in 7th. He was back in 6th place for his second prone, missed 2 more, and left in 9th. Missing 1 in the last shooting, he left the range in 9th again of the 20 and finished in 9th place temporarily. Later finishers with better times pushed him down to a final result of 16th, 4:19.5 behind the winner from Canada, who finished the race in 32:56.6 with clean shooting. 

He was followed by Jake Pearson, WY, in 49th with 4 misses finishing 7:45 back; Alex Kilby, AK, in 75th with 5 misses 9:51 back and Eli Nielsen WA, in 91st with 11 misses 14:36 back.

In the Youth Women’s 10 km Mass Start

Chloe Levins, VT, was the US top finisher, shooting 1,1,1,0, and finishing in 14th, 3:06 behind the French winner who missed 1 shot and finished in 34:00. Grace Gilliland, AK finished 46th shooting 1,1,1,1 and finishing 6:29 back; Amanda Kautzer, Twin Cites Biathlon, finished 53rd shooting 2,1,4,1 and finishing 7:14 back. Amanda struggled with her prone today, and missed one shot each time in standing. Helen Wilson, AK, was in 62nd place, missing 6 and finishing 9:01 back.

Start list for tomorrow; [4:00 CST am for men, 7:00 am for women—live results scoreboard only]

Junior Men- 15 km
Cam Christiansen MN  #21
Travis Cooper AK          #39
Cody Johnson ME         # 55
Peter Carrroll  CA          #72
there are 29 Nations with 87 total starters

Junior Women—12.5 km
Siena Ellingson, MN   #12
Nina Armstrong, NY,  #28
There are 27 Nations with 70 total starters

Bold= been in Europe for several weeks
Good Luck to all!!
Bill Meyer