While Canmore’s Nathan Smith dream season led the Canadian to an 11th place result in the men’s biathlon 12.5 km pursuit at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, the man they call Jeep watched his descend into nightmare.
Smith shot 19/20 and finished a mere 49 seconds behind winner Martin Fourcade of France and was one of the fastest athletes in the range. He grew stronger as the race progressed to record the second-best pursuit of his career.
“I’m really happy. I should be able to get into the (30-man) mass start now, especially if I have a good individual race (on Thursday),” Smith said.
Starting in the 13th position, Smith used is strong shooting to stay with the second pack. With incredible skis, he pushed the pace to keep up with the likes of his hero, Norweigan Ole Einar Bjoerndalen, who won gold two days prior. Heading into the race, he wanted a top-10 result, but just missed the goal when Dominik Landertinger of Austria edged him at the line.
While Smith was beaming after his race, Le Guellec was distraught – with plenty of reason. The fiery Quebecois started in fifth position but found himself in the lead at the midway point when disaster struck. With a 20-metre lead on second place, LeGuellec hit an icy patch on a treacherous corner and flew superman style into the hard-packed course. The tumble broke his ski and Le Guellec had to wait for a new one, watching in vain as 15 skiers flew past him. The fall also clogged his sights with snow, so he missed three of his next 10 shots and ended up in 26th.
Heading into the race, he wanted to stay in a position to attack and was well on his way to achieving his goal. Angry after missing the podium in the sprint (where he recorded the best Olympic male performance in Canadian history), he was motivated for the pursuit. His previous best result at the Olympics was in Vancouver, where he finished sixth in the pursuit.
Brendan Green missed four shots to fall out of contention early, but his ski speed allowed him to hold onto 35th position. He’ll need a strong result in the individual race to qualify for the mass start.
The top 60 athletes compete in the pursuit, while the top 30-ranked athletes will compete in the mass start. The Canadians will also team up for the team relay and mixed relay on Feb. 19 and 22.
