The Estonian Summer Biathlon championships took place the weekend of September 6th and 7th with a Sprint on Saturday followed by a Mass Start on Sunday. Overall conditions in Otepaa that weekend were gorgeous. A perfect weekend for a sun weekend of summer racing!
Sprint
The women’s Sprint was carried by Susan Kuelm who had the best shooting of the top contenders. Coming off of the best season of her career with two top 20’s and four top 30’s, including a career best finish of 12th, the 29 year old hit 9/10 and took the gold medal. Even with another miss her skiing and shooting speed were more than enough to take the day.
Kuelm was followed on the podium by Regina Ermits who hit 7/10 for the silver medal. Ermits actually had a miss more than Tuuli Tomingas but was still able to surpass her by 19 seconds for the silver medal. While Kuelm was the fastest skier on the day Regina Ermits was a solid 2nd fastest on the day. Nothing to be ashamed of. Tuuli Tomingas came home with the bronze medal. She was leading the race after the first shooting check point, but she was done in by a slower 2nd shoot and she faded on the last loop as well.
| Women’s Podium | Men’s Podium |
| 🥇Susan Kuelm (9/10) | 🥇Mark Markos Kehva (10/10) |
| 🥈Regina Ermits +1:11 (7/10) | 🥈Kristo Siimer +57 (8/10) |
| 🥉Tuuli Tomingas +1:30 (8/10) | 🥉Rene Zahkna +58 (7/10) |
| 4) Emma Rajando +2:29 (8/10) | 4) Karl Rasmus Tiislar +2:16 (9/10) |
| 5) Grete Gaim +3:27 (7/10) | 5) Albert Marjeta +2:51 (9/10) |
| 6) Pauline Puusaar +3:46 (8/10) | 6) Joosep Perv +5:26 (6/10) |
The men’s Sprint was taken by Mark Markos Kehva who, not surprisingly paced the field in shooting. The last few seasons he’s been hitting better than 90% of his shots so for him 10/10 was no trouble. While he was well outpaced by Siimer and Zahkna on the skis it didn’t matter. They couldn’t make up that much ground for their misses on the range.
Kristo Siimer (8/10) and Rene Zahkna (7/10), meanwhile, fought a pitched battle for the silver and bronze medals. It was a back and forth battle all day. After the first lap their times were separated by just 0.1 seconds. Zahkna had 2 misses in the first shoot while Siimer had just a single miss. However Zahkna was much faster shooting so he was actually only down by less 8 seconds after the completion of the first loop. By the time they finished the 2nd lap Zahkna actually was faster by just under 5 seconds. They each had a single miss in the 2nd shoot and after their respective penalty loops Zahkna actually was 11 seconds faster. However, Zahkna faded in the last lap while Siimer surged forward and ended up 0.9 seconds faster than Zahkna at the finish line. Quite a race!
u21 Sprint
| Women’s Podium | Men’s Podium |
| 🥇Kretel Kaljumae (7/10) | 🥇Yaraslov Neverov (5/10) |
| 🥈Angelina Usolkina +3:14 (8/10) | 🥈Maarnus Udam +2 (7/10) |
| 🥉Marii Vanaveski +4:09 (8/10) | 🥉Raasmus Vainomae +9 (8/10) |
The u21 athletes competed separately from the seniors. I wanted to note them particularly because of Yaraslov Neverov who a 20 year old young man with serious speed. As is the case if you can’t hit the targets it’s still not enough to reach your ultimate goals. Neverov is quite young though and we’ll see if he can find his accuracy with the rifle soon!
Mass Start
On Sunday it was another beautiful day for racing! The only cloud on the day was that Tuuli Tomingas was not ale to start the race. In the Mass Starts the u21 athletes ran alongside the senior athletes and in some cases took advantage of that to take home some glory!
In the women’s Mass Start Regina Ermits took the short, yet huge, step from the silver medal position to the top of the podium. Everything about the race was terrific. Ermits hit 18/20 shots which was the best of the day in the women’s field. Additionally she was the fastest woman for the first three ski laps. After Kuelm had four misses on the third shoot the win was basically in the bag for Ermits. At that point she just had to make it around in one piece and hit her shots. It was a great way for her to cap off a great weekend!
Susan Kuelm finished off a similarly excellent weekend with a silver medal. The only blemish on her weekend was the poor third shooting in the Mass Start. Without that there is a chance she would have taken home two gold medals. Regardless, it was a an excellent weekend.
Kretel Kaljumae, a 20 year old Junior, took home the bronze. She hit 18/20 targets to match Regina Ermits. Not surprisingly, just 20 years old, she didn’t quite have the ski speed to take advantage of that. But it was still good enough for a spot on the podium!
| Women’s Podium | Men’s Podium |
| 🥇Regina Ermits (18/20) | 🥇Rene Zahkna (18/20) |
| 🥈Susan Kuelm +2:14 (14/20) | 🥈Jakob Kulbin +6 (18/20) |
| 🥉Kretel Kaljumae +4:03 (18/20) | 🥉Mark Markos Kehva +15 (16/20) |
| 4) Grete Gaim +6:06 (13/20) | 4) Kristo Siimer +1:30 (16/20) |
| 5) Elisabeth Bremann (15/20) | 5) Yaraslov Neverov +2:01 (11/20) |
| 6) Paulina Puusaar (15/20) | 6) Rasmus Vainomae +2:16 (16/20) |
Rene Zahkna quickly made up for his disappointment at finishing less than 1 second out of the silver medal in the Sprint. In this race it was Jakob Kulbin who was going head to head with Zahkna. The two ended up side by side at the end of the final shooting. Zahkna was just coming off the penalty loop, his second trip there of the day, while Kulbin was making a very solid comeback. Kulbin had two misses in the opening shooting but went clean the rest of the day. They entered the final lap side by side. For his credit Mark markos Kehva 13 seconds further back.
Over the course of the final lap, the veteran Zahkna was able to pull ahead of the youngster Kulbin and ended up winning by a solid six seconds. It was a great contest for the final race of the weekend! Kehva himself had a solid final lap losing just two seconds to Zahkna and coming home with a respectable bronze medal.
The Sprint silver medalist Kristo Siimer finished up in 4th after a four miss effort. He was actually leading the race after going 10/10 to start the race. However he had two misses each in the two standing shootings. He was still in contact with the lead pack heading to the final shooting, but after those final two misses he fell back and didn’t push quite as hard knowing he was out of the running for the bronze.
Youngster Yaraslov Neverov, with another tough shooting day, finished 5th. Once again very good skiing but the shooting let him down.