Hi Everyone-
A short note tonight.

In the Sprint races at Nove Mesto in the Open European Jr Championships, as you may recall from the last report, Vasek Cervenka from Mt Itasca Biathlon was the only US team member to make the top 60 and thus move on to the Pursuit race yesterday. So he started with his time back from the Sprint, 1:24 behind the first out. With the rest of the team on the course cheering him on, Vasek finished in 29th, shooting 2,1,0,1 and finishing 3:52 behind the winner, M Zemlincka of the Czech Republic who started in 5th and shot 0,0,1,1 and finished the 12.5km race in 36:06.6.

For the next two weeks the US athletes will stay in Nove Mesto which is SE of Prague, training daily now for the Youth and Junior Championships which start on Wednesday, Feb 22nd with the Youth Individual Races. On the 23rd will be the Junior Individual races which in some years have been streamed online. Watch for those. Generally the Youth events have not been televised.

So on Sunday the 19th the Youth and Junior team will move to Brezno-Osrblie, Slovakia, to get used to the venue, test skis and shift to prerace training routines for the next few days before the races start.

Meanwhile, on this Thursday the 9th of Feb at 7:45 our time, the World Championships will begin with the Mixed Relay. These will, of course, be televised live and available to watch later on EuroSport. Senior Worlds this year are in Hochfilzen, Austria. Events are scheduled daily except Mon/Tues the 13/14th and run through the 19th. The US will have a full roster of seniors at these events.

Enjoy—more later
Bill Meyer