Biathlon : Emilien Jacquelin satisfied with third place and the French hat-trick
Emilien Jacquelin has not been the third best biathlete on the planet for nothing since the start of the season. The Frenchman has been on the biathlon World Cup podium three times since the start of the season, and won a fourth podium this Friday in the sprint in Oberhof (Germany).

Third in a fantastic French hat-trick in which he was beaten by Quentin Fillon-Maillet and Fabien Claude, the Dauphinois was satisfied with this performance in which he let only one bullet escape during his standing shot: “I’m happy to be part of these hat-tricks and it’s good for the team. If this had been a French Cup, I’d have been disappointed to finish third, but in the World Cup, you take it [Laughs],” he told La Chaîne L’Équipe after the day’s race.
“In top-level sport, there are ups and downs. But as long as you accept it and stick with it and try to move forward, there are always good days ahead. This hat-trick proves that,” adds the player who has risen from the ashes this season after several difficult winters.

And yet, it took a lot of hard work to enable the French team to move into the top 3. The fifth fastest skier in the event, the Isérois showed some fine tactics to save his strength. “Since the end of last season, my race management has become a little more ‘mature’. In the warm-up, my sensations weren’t the best and I felt sluggish,” he explains. I knew that I didn’t have the necessary explosive power, but that if I managed it well, there was a way of being consistent and limiting the damage.
“On my feet, the best defence was attack and I got my shot away”.Emilien Jacquelin on La Chaîne L’Équipe
Patient on the track, but not just that. In conditions that were still windy, Emilien Jacquelin set his shot as he has done for several competitions now. “Today, the conditions varied from one athlete to another. I took my time on the horizontal because I wasn’t really sure what was going to happen with the wind,” he admits. On the standing, the best defence was attack and I got my shot away. That’s enough for me to go for a podium finish and I’ll take it.