Biathlon: only Elvira Oeberg beat Julia Simon
In December 2019, Nordic Magazine profiled Julia Simon, then a young biathlete beginning to reveal herself to the world on the world circuit. At the time, we explained that, for the Beaufortaine, walls were springboards. In fact, that was the title of this long portrait.
“It’s when things get tough that she’s at her strongest. Her injuries have given her a mentality and a character that can withstand anything. She’s learnt to manage her career with that in mind and she always bounces back stronger afterwards, that’s her great strength”, explained Richard Loosen, from the Club des Sports des Saisies (Savoie). So it’s hardly surprising that Julia Simon managed to bounce back on Sunday after the huge disappointment of her sprint, which ended in an anonymous forty-seventh place.
Almost distraught, the Savoyard said in the mixed zone that this setback was “hurting my head”. “The desire is there, but I’m looking for myself, I can’t put things together at all. On the skis, I’m suffering. Even though I did a great warm-up to get off to the hottest start possible, it’s just not responding. Cyril [Burdet] warned me that the start of the season would be tough, but I was hoping for a bit of a turnaround,” she added.
She was there in full force for the Sunday mass-start.
She launches her winter
“I’m mainly going to try and put things in place at the shooting range, that’s all I can manage at the moment”, she promised. Julia Simon, who scored 18/20 and is back on cross-country skis, got off to a superb start, putting herself at the head of the pack despite starting with an unusual number 29.
Although she made a mistake on each of her prone shots, the customs officer from the Beaufortain region produced two of her secret fast fulls on her standing passages to… come out on top of the shooting range before the final round of cross-country skiing. Just 5 seconds behind, Swedish yellow number Elvira Oeberg (18/20) made up the deficit and then left the Frenchwoman to go on and claim a magnificent victory, but the most important thing – the podium – was there for Julia Simon.
Resisting the comeback of a number of rivals in the final kilometres, she finished second and put her mind at rest. On the third step of the podium was Germany’s Franziska Preuss (18/20), while Vanessa Voigt (20/20), Julia Tannheimer (19/20) and Dorothea Wierer (19/20) completed the flower ceremony.
The other French girls are Lou Jeanmonnot (18/20) in eighth place, Justine Braisaz-Bouchet (17/20) in ninth, Jeanne Richard (18/20) in twelfth and Océane Michelon (16/20) in seventeenth.
JULIA IS BACK 💪🏼🇫🇷
First podium of the season for Julia Simon, 2nd in the Kontiolahti mass start 👏🏼🥈
The Frenchwoman relied on her exceptional shooting speed and scores a fine 18/20.
📸 Nordic Focus pic.twitter.com/EWOGnVMslY– FFS – Fédération Française de Ski (@FedFranceSki) December 8, 2024
Full results
- The full programme for the Kontiolahti World Cup, the first stage of the 2024/2025 season
- Corinne Niogret: my best memory of… Kontiolahti
- Top 3 nations cup target for France: the hunt for Olympic quotas for Milan/Cortina 2026, the other key issue of the 2024/2025 season
- World Cup overall leaders celebrated: this season, the IBU is introducing a yellow bib award ceremony
- After the opening relays, what is the programme for the second week of the Kontiolahti World Cup?
- Kontiolahti: where does Emilien Jacquelin’s “Night Night” celebration at the relay finish line come from?
- “I can’t wait to see how he performs”, “He’s progressed, he deserves it”: Emilien Claude’s return to the World Cup is a source of great joy to those close to him, Anna Gandler and Fabien Claude.
- “It’s time for me to come into my own and become the biathlete I was a few years ago”: Fabien Claude, the winter of affirmation at last?
- Kontiolahti: Endre Stroemsheim, at 20/20, beats Johannes Thingnes Boe in the individual short, Quentin Fillon-Maillet and Eric Perrot with the flowers
- Kontiolahti: for the first time in his career, Endre Stroemsheim will don the yellow World Cup leader’s bib
- “My best race ever”: Endre Stroemsheim and the Norwegians put everyone in agreement at Kontiolahti
- “With a full house, we could have been ahead…”: satisfaction, but also frustration for Quentin Fillon-Maillet and Eric Perrot, in the top 6 of the individual short in Kontiolahti.
- Ukraine’s Vitalii Mandzyn, sensation of the individual short with his fourth place: “I hope this is just the beginning”.
- “A dream come true”: ninth in the individual short at Kontiolahti, Thierry Langer scored his first World Cup top 10 finish
- “It’s performances and results that count”: in Kontiolahti and Hochfilzen, the seven girls in the French team are fighting to take part in the Grand-Bornand World Cup.
- Lou Jeanmonnot is about to embark on the season of all possibilities: “Playing the globe honestly, trying to keep a jersey and manage the pressure”.
- Kontiolahti: Julia Simon undergoes an MRI scan early this afternoon
- Kontiolahti: still uncertain about Julia Simon’s state of health on the eve of the individual short race
- Kontiolahti: despite injuring her left calf on the relay last Sunday, Julia Simon is taking part in the individual short race.
- Kontiolahti: on cloud nine with a 20/20, Lou Jeanmonnot dominates the individual short and gets her season off to an ideal start
- Kontiolahti: after wearing it for the first time in Hochfilzen in December 2023, Lou Jeanmonnot takes the yellow bib once again
- Kontiolahti: in Saturday’s sprint, Océane Michelon will become the first Frenchwoman to wear the blue number
- Lou Jeanmonnot’s satisfaction after her success in the Kontiolahti individual short: “I’m relieved to see that I’m not out of my depth”.
- “I didn’t feel any pain”: despite a modest 31st place in the Kontiolahti individual short, Julia Simon was reassuring about her left calf.
- “Beyond anything I could have imagined”: Ella Halvarsson, tears over her first World Cup podium in the individual short in Kontiolahti
- “I still can’t believe it”: the joy of Poland’s Natalia Sidorowicz, fourth in the individual short at Kontiolahti
- Frozen fingers, rifle problems, 92nd at the finish: Anamarija Lampic had one problem after another in the individual short at Kontiolahti.
- “It’s good for my head”: Anna Gandler explains why she does juggling sessions before her World Cup races
- Kontiolahti: Emilien Jacquelin, with a 10/10, takes the sprint and wins the World Cup for the first time in almost three years
- Kontiolahti: Emilien Jacquelin takes the red sprint bib, Johannes Thingnes Boe in yellow
- “There’s nothing exceptional about it”: after his magnificent success in the Kontiolahti sprint, Emilien Jacquelin is not getting carried away.
- Emilien Jacquelin tells Nordic Magazine after his resounding victory in the Kontiolahti sprint: “On the podium, I saw myself three years ago in Le Grand-Bornand…”.
- “A private joke with a friend”: after the relay’s “Night Night”, Emilien Jacquelin celebrated his success in the Kontiolahti sprint with a finger on his mouth.
- “I had tears in my eyes”: Ole Einar Bjoerndalen was marked by Emilien Jacquelin’s return to favour
- “It did me good to get away from group A”: Antonin Guigonnat returned to the World Cup top 10 in the Kontiolahti sprint
- Kontiolahti: fourth in the sprint, New Zealand-born American Campbell Wright came close to pulling off a huge coup
- “Make it my strength, not my weakness”: Lou Jeanmonnot’s state of mind as he tackles the Kontiolahti sprint with the yellow bib on his shoulders.
- Kontiolahti: Czech Marketa Davidova makes a comeback to win the sprint, Océane Michelon tops the French rankings
- Kontiolahti: Lou Jeanmonnot loses her yellow bib (already), Elvira Oeberg takes it over
- “I was already off the mat mentally while I was still on it physically”: how Lou Jeanmonnot got out of her standing shot in the Kontiolahti sprint.
- Kontiolahti: tenth in the sprint, Océane Michelon keeps her blue bib as best U23 rider
- “The desire is there, but I’m trying to find my way, I can’t seem to put things together”: 47th in the Kontiolahti sprint, her worst result since December 2021, Julia Simon is worried.
- On the eve of his 30th birthday, Suvi Minkkinen takes his first World Cup podium finish
- 52 seconds 6 on the mat, 20 seconds between the fourth and fifth ball: a look back at Justine Braisaz-Bouchet’s interminable recumbent shot in the Kontiolahti sprint.
- Kontiolahti: first World Cup mass-start day for Jeanne Richard and Océane Michelon
- “There’s nothing dangerous”: once again hampered by a heart rhythm problem during the Kontiolahti sprint, Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold isn’t panicking
