Happiness multiplies beyond the finish line. Or suffering, depending on how well you did your job. In a relay race like this, you win and lose together, but everyone has to pass their tests on their own first. And when the last climb has been mastered, the journey to the stadium completed, then the final runner sees his colleagues running towards him, wide-eyed, arms in the air.
On Tuesday afternoon in Zhangjiakou, Philipp Nawrath was at the finish and was all alone. Around him three teams, captured Norwegians and French; they screamed loudly, they jumped. The Russians also came together briefly. Philipp Nawrath unbuckled his skis and walked away.
Loneliness can have different reasons in biathlon, barely ten minutes earlier Russia’s anchor Eduard Latypow was alone at the shooting range, the gold medal actually already in his pocket. The 27-year-old had so much advantage in this Olympic race that he was completely abandoned on the mat and was able to fire his five shots without anyone being in sight. There was no pressure to score quickly and he was allowed to make mistakes. But sometimes it’s the hardest when it looks the simplest: only one out of five panes flipped over. And then the one minute advantage was gone, Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen for Norway and France’s Quentin Fillon Maillet headed for the shooting range – along with Nawrath.
Nawrath fought, needed all the extra cartridges – and had to go into the extra round
It was now about the Olympic victory. And, of course: Nawrath, 29, had already noticed what was happening three mats next to him. “There were a lot of thoughts going through my head,” he later said. He knew “that the thing could now be bagged here” – as a newcomer to the Olympics, what kind of story would that be? But he also knew “that someone has problems and that it may be transferred to someone else”. Latypow missed two shots at the end and went into the penalty loop, Fillon Maillet needed two spare rounds, only Christiansen pulled away. Nawrath needed all the extra cartridges and had to shoot the extra lap. Gold went to Norway ahead of France and the Russians.
Benedikt Doll (right) changes to Philipp Nawrath in a promising position, after which the disaster takes its course.
(Photo: Hendrik Schmidt/dpa)
The last runners can be the heroes or the ones who get everything out of their hands. The position is anything but coveted in the German team, even in the years when they had winners, nobody wanted to start in the end. Philipp Nawrath, who is currently completing the most stable season of his career, was not afraid of it, he has already proven himself in this position. But the Olympics are different from the World Cup. “That was the first penalty loop ever, which is doubly and trebly annoying,” he said. “We had more than one finger on the medal,” said Erik Lesser.
Finally, Benedikt Doll was the first to offer consolation. “He has nothing to blame himself for,” he said to Nawrath, “I’ve already had enough penalties in the relay.” Before Nawrath stepped in front of the microphones, Lesser hugged briefly. “I’m so sorry,” he said, wiping the tears from his eyes. “Oh, all right,” Lesser replied. And then he had even warmer words for him: “Philipp is on a great way towards stardom. He could have become a superstar today if he had won the gold medal.”
The German men had been looking forward to February 15 for a long time, and Mark Kirchner also wanted to crown his time as national coach. Several have become world champions and medal winners under him, at the Olympics there was relay silver in 2014 in Sochi and bronze in 2018 in Pyeongchang. At the beginning of the season, Kirchner announced gold as a goal for China. And that was actually possible in the end, although these games had not yet yielded a medal for the German men – quite different from the Norwegians, French and Russians. The medal would have been on the tray, said Kirchner, but “simply taking it down and putting it on our shoulders” unfortunately didn’t work.
“I take absolutely nothing from these games,” says Erik Lesser
Starting runner Lesser had problems with three spares in the standing stage in minus 16 degrees, he passed to Roman Rees in eighth. The 28-year-old was already there in Pyeongchang, but didn’t play, now he did his job properly: With just one additional cartridge, he moved up to fifth place. Benedikt Doll then had to deal with Johannes Thingnes Bö and was able to keep up because he shot safely and didn’t let himself be shaken off. He also needed a spare. Nawrath started the race in fourth place, almost at the same time as Christiansen, who was third. After five hits in prone, the German even took second place. “Everything was actually perfect from my standing shooting to Philipps,” Lesser summed it up aptly.
Gold again: The Norwegians heart anchor Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen (centre).
(Photo: Odd Andersen/AFP)
It was the last Olympic race for the 33-year-old, he doesn’t want to do that for another four years, you have to put it that way, because he also said: “Somehow I envy Arnd Peiffer, who said last season, bye bye, Beijing I won’t give myself any more.” Lesser had won individual silver in Sochi in 2014 and the relay medal, the games now in China had been disappointing for him. In the individual he finished 67th, for the sprint he was no longer set up and so he could not qualify for the mass start either. “I’m not taking anything from these games,” he said, “neither a medal nor a good result. A good time was limited here too.”
Lesser and Doll are the only athletes on the team who have won World Championships or Olympic medals. Doll, 31, doesn’t want to go to the Olympics again either. The mass start on Friday is the last chance for the German men to get something countable in China. Doll and Rees each managed sixth place in individual and pursuit, but the men did not go further than fifth place in the mixed relay in these games. What is still possible now? “A few things,” said Roman Rees, “but as in the first individual races, the favorites will certainly be different.”