To 2010 Daily Vancouver Homepage
Info, Tips, and News about the 2010 Vancouver and Whistler Winter Olympic Games
 XML feed
Home » blogs » Boris Mann's blog

Darren loves Biathlon

Submitted by Boris Mann on Sun, 2006-02-19 16:06. biathlon | Darren Barefoot | winter olympics

Darren Barefoot explains why Biathlon is his favourite event, and also covers some of the background of how it came to be:

After hockey, I think biathlon is my favourite event in the Winter Olympics. I like its peculiar, conflicting combination of activities--cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. It's conflicting, of course, because the skiing gets your heart rate up to 180 beats per minute, which isn't particularly conducive to shooting a silver-dollar-sized target half a football field away. I had assumed it had its origins in hunting, but actually we can blame the Norweigians.

What's your favourite Winter Olympic sport?

» Boris Mann's blog | 1105 reads
I agree about biathlon. That
Submitted by Tourist (not verified) on Sat, 2006-02-25 19:03.
I agree about biathlon. That is why I am trying to figure out how the hell I am going to afford a trip to Whistler to see it in 2010. Any ideas?
login to post comments
Ski Jumping should be called Ski Falling
davethorvald's picture
Submitted by davethorvald on Sun, 2006-02-19 12:37.

I saw a wide variety of events in SLC and the two biggest viewing surpriese were ski jumping and cross country skiing.

Ski jumping, which should be called Ski Falling, blew my mind - the massive size of the hill, the wee-ness of the skiiers and the gracefullness of the whole routine. One second the jumper is a speck atop a masive tower, and a blink later, the skier is sliding to a stop next to you in a puffy suit, after a controlled fall that must feel like a flying for a hour when you are doing it.

The other surprise from an observational standpoint was cross-country skiing, and biathlon for that matter. One advantage is being able to roam the course and check the action from different persepctives and vantage points. Especially in the 50km when most every country fields an entry (Costa Rica, Nepal ...) so the course is well populated by racers.

Makes for a fun afternoon outdoors and socializing while watching fantastic aerobic monsters athletes work the course. At SLC Games, the x-country races at Soldier Hollow were spiced up a bit with an on-site pioneer village in which local folks lived old-timey style for the duration of the games.

Note: I have pics of the later-day mountain men that I will try to Flickr-ize as part of my SLC Flashback series which, alas, has taken a backseat to the Torino coverage.


login to post comments

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.