Last Updated: 23.Jan.2014

Starting in fourth position in the pursuit race in Antholz must have been an intimidating prospect for Susan Dunklee, after her career best finish in the sprint race two days prior. But Susan didn’t let the pressure get to her and skied with the lead pack for 3 laps, switching off with eventual winner Andrea Henkel of Germany. She cleaned the first stage and only missed one on the second stage, putting her in a great position coming into the final two shooting stages. However, 3 misses on the third stage put her in the penalty loop and she had to watch the leaders ski away. She ended the day in 24th place after 1 miss in her final stage. It was a strong result, although frustrating considering her great start position. The takeaway for Susan from the pursuit must be that she is clearly capable of skiing with the World Cup leaders, and with slightly better shooting she could be a serious contender. Every World Cup leading up to the Olympics is just added experience, and Susan is learning a lot from every race.

The pursuit race went off as planned on Saturday the 18th. Hannah Dreissigacker didn’t compete in the pursuit after a broken rifle stock forced her to drop out of the sprint, but she was planning to race the relay the following day, the 19th. However, for the second time this year foul weather conditions forced the organizers to cancel the race partway through. This time it wasn’t wind, but incessant, thick fog. While Susan, the scramble leg, was warming up she used more than double the usual time to zero due to the foggy range. It cleared up for her leg though and she was able to shoot without a problem. In fact, after her leg the US women were in a great position, around 5th place. However, during the second leg the fog rolled back in and made shooting impossible so they called off the race. There is no telling how well the Americans could have finished; now eager fans will have to wait until the Olympic relay to find out how fast the girls really are.

Antholz was the very last World Cup before Sochi, so now Hannah and Susan will stay in Italy and train for another week or so before heading to Munich for athlete processing, and finally the flight to Russia. They met up with fellow CGRP skiers Ida Sargent and Liz Guiney in Italy; Ida is preparing for the World Cup next weekend and Liz for U23’s in Val di Fiemme starting on the first. Check the blog for pictures of the beautiful skiing in Toblach and stay tuned for more results and reports!

Results from the Antholz weekend at the IBU Datacenter.