Over the last several years the Canadian team has been in a serious era of fluctuations. There have been multiple coaching changes. The key players of the last decade plus of Canadian biathlon have retired with Emma Lunder and the Gow brothers have left the team in the last few years. We’ve also seen promising up and coming young athletes leave the team as well including Jules Burnotte. All in all it gives almost an air of chaos to the feeling around the team.
And yet! In the midst of all of this there are some seriously promising signs that the team is starting to turn over to a new, young, and talented generation. On the women’s side we’ve been monitoring the progress of Pascale Paradis over the last several years and now she’s competing successfully on the World Cup. Nadia Moser has been finding new levels of success. Shilo Rousseau is looking better than ever this summer including some excellent racing at the Canadian trials. On the men’s side Adam Runnalls continues to hold as a solid athlete regularly fighting for top 20’s and 30’s. Then we have young men like Jasper Flemming, Malcom McCulloch, and especially Luke Hulshof coming up as well.
The new coaching duo of Andrew Chisholm and Helene Joergensen have to be excited about the development of these young athletes. While 2025-2026 may not be the season in which they all reach their peaks, it certainly looks like an optimistic season. Personally I’m incredibly excited about the next few years for Biathlon Canada!
Women – The Canadian women will be entering their first season without standout Emma Lunder since she first stepped to a World Cup starting line in the 2013-2014 season. That doesn’t mean they are without talent though! Pascale Paradis is young and continues to improve every season. Nadia Moser seems like she’s ready to take another step forward. Benita Peiffer. Shilo Rousseau. Emily Dickson. Moira Green. Sure this isn’t a roster that will strike fear in the French or Swedish team. But it’s certainly a team with talent to have a solid season. Last year they were 16th on the World Cup. They can definitely move up this season.
Head Coach: Andrew Chisholm & Helene Joergensen
2024-2025 Nations Cup Rank: 16th
2024-2025 Relay Finishes: 14th, 12th, 9th, 10th, 20th, and 14th
Quota: 4 Athletes to Start
World Cup – The Canadian women will have four women starting each race and sitting here in November before the start of the season, assuming health, we can pretty much be assured of three of the starting positions: Pascale Paradis, Nadia Moser, and Benita Peiffer. Beyond those three there will be an opening. For now it will go to Shilo Rousseau (who to be fair has looked amazing this summer). But it’s likely we’ll see a handful of women get World Cup starts before the end of the season.
Nadia Moser (28)
During the 2022 Olympic season Nadia Moser seemed to be well positioned to stake a claim to one of the coveted roster spots for the Beijing Olympic Games. Then in December, while having some fun in Hochfilzen after the racing that weekend, Moser had a freak accident while on a toboggan/sled and broke her ankle. She not only missed the Olympics but the entire rest of the season. I can only imagine the heartbreak. A moment of light hearted fun and team bonding turns into a real tragedy. It had to feel like all of that work with the ultimate goal to make the Olympics was gone.
Moser apparently used that as fuel. She came out in 2022-2023 and had a major career year with 10 top 40’s and five top 30’s on her way to 44th in the Overall. She hasn’t quite been able to keep up that momentum though putting up six more top 40’s in the last two seasons and just one top 30.
From a brief glance at her statistics Moser was driven to her peak season by her skiing as much as anything else. She had her best skiing of her career that season as she was just 0.7% back of median with an average course time rank of 47th. Over the last to years she just hasn’t quite gotten there as she had average course time ranks of 57th and 60th. Her shooting though has actually been pretty good. She hit 84.8% in 22-23, her career season to date, and improved upon that for 85.5% last season.
| Prone % | Standing % | Total % | Shooting Time | |
| 2019-2020 | 76.3 | 62.5 | 69.4 | 28.2 |
| 2020-2021 | 83.8 | 76.3 | 80 | 29.8 |
| 2021-2022 | 92 | 88 | 90 | 29.2 |
| 2022-2023 | 90.4 | 79.2 | 84.8 | 26.7 |
| 2023-2024 | 79 | 81 | 80 | 28.4 |
| 2024-2025 | 87.3 | 83.6 | 85.5 | 29.4 |
This season, with the retirement of Emma Lunder, Nadia Moser becomes the senior member of the women’s Senior team. I’m sure the leadership will really be shared by the three leading ladies, but that may add some pressure to her this season. For Moser in particular though, the shooting is definitely in place. We know that the skiing can be there, just like we saw a coupe of years ago. The 24-25 season was a little faster than the 23-24 season. Hopefully that’s a sign that she’s primed to get back to her 22-23 level if no better. It’s her season to shine as she looks ready to get her overdue Olympic moment.
Pascale Paradis (23)
If you’ve been following or listening to me for any length of time you’ve heard me talking about Pascale Paradis. It started with her performances at Youth and Junior Worlds. Sure the four top 20’s including 6th in the 2018 Youth Worlds Individual were great. Really it was the ski speed. In the 2022 Junior Worlds for example her course time ranks were 6th, 4th, and 8th. That’s going up against the likes of Oceane Michelon, Tereza Vobornikova, and Hannah Auchentaller. That competition is no joke. We just don’t see competitive speed like that out of juniors in North America very often!
The next two years she has raced a limited number of IBU Cup events as she was focusing on her studies at the University of Alaska. However in those 12 races across those two seasons she still put up nine top 26 finishes including six top 20’s and a career best 6th.
In the 2024-2025 campaign she made her long awaited jump to the World Cup and she didn’t look back. She finished in the top 40 three times including 38th in the Sprint at Lenzerheide World Championships and 36th in the Oslo-Holmenkollen Sprint. She only missed out on the Pursuit three different times. All in all that was a very good debut season and left us hankering for more!
In the 2024-2025 season she didn’t quite ski up to her potential yet as she ran 2.4% slower than median with an average course time rank of 63rd. But she’s just 23 years old as the season gets under way. She is still quite young! She hit 82% of her total shots which was up nicely from her Juniors racing. It was actually down from the roughly 84.5% she hit over 10 IBU Cup races the prior two years though. That probably indicates she was a little off from her peak shooting. Her average shooting speed of 30.7 seconds was also just average for the World Cup.
As the 2025-2026 season gets under way I maintain a high level of enthusiasm for Pascale Paradis, both this season and even more for the future. She’s probably still 3-4 seasons away from reaching her skiing potential. Even if she never quite gets to the high bar she set for herself as a Junior, she still can reach an average course time rank in the top 30 at least. Her shooting seems to have progressed to the point where last years 82% was her floor. There is no reason to believe she can’t build on that at least into the mid 80’s if not higher. I’m not saying Paradis is going to contend for top 10’s every week. But a career like Emma Lunder’s, being the Canadian standard bearer with several top 40 Overall finishes and occasional top 10 finishes in races is definitely a possibility and that would be very exciting!
If you want a taste of her tremendous talent just check out the Frassinoro Festival from this summer. She took home the gold and even overcame a target malfunction in the finals to come back for the glory. She looked so good going against the top Italians as well as a handful of international competitors including Anastasiya Kuzmina and Anamarija Lampic. So good!
Benita Peiffer (25)
The third of the three returning leaders of the Canadian women is Benita Peiffer. After racing three seasons consistently on the World Cup, she ran most of last season on the IBU Cup. The good is that she took the opportunity to put up some of the best racing of her career Over the first trimester on the IBU Cup she finished outside the top 22 just twice (30th and 32nd). Meanwhile she had five top 20’s and the first top 10 of her career finishing 10th in the Geilo Individual. Even with only racing one additional IBU Cup weekend she still finished 42nd in the IBU Cup Overall.
She concluded the season on the World Cup with the last trimester. She finished 62nd in the Nove Mesto Sprint to barely miss out on the Pursuit. That ended up being her best finish of the final trimester. Looking back to her World Cup racing in 23-24 she consistently raced into the top 60 including four top 40’s. The combination of her World Cup racing in 2023-2024 and her IBU Cup racing in 2024-2025 was the best of her career to date.
She’s come along nicely with her shooting over the last few seasons as she gotten her hit rate up into the low 80’s. Last season she hit 82.7% on the IBU Cup and in her limited World Cup time she hit 85% of her shots.
The skiing is where the biggest avenue for improvement remains. It’s difficult to compare IBU Cup to World Cup skiing because the levels can be so different. However, let’s do our best. On the World Cup in the 2023-2024 she skied 1.3% slower than median. Last year she skied 2.6% faster than median on the IBU Cup. It was actually her slowest season to date when measured in that context. Her average course time rank in the last two seasons came down from 11th in 22-23 down to 24th in 24-25. She saw a similar decline in skiing over the last two seasons on the World Cup from an average course time rank of 50th in 23-24 down to 71st in 24-25 in limited racing.
While it’s a very difficult comparison it does feel like her skiing is trending in the wrong direction over the last two seasons. We know that she’s a bit faster than she’s shown so far. And she’s still so young having just turned 25 in September. We’ve also seen her shooting come along so nicely. After the performance we saw last year on the IBU Cup, and most impressively the consistency in that performance, I remain hopeful. I’m hopeful that the new coaching staff can pull out even higher levels of performance. That she can at least recapture the skiing from a couple of seasons ago, and that she can continue to build on her current shooting trajectory. With that we’ll see if she can find her way back to the World Cup top 30’s or even challenge her career best of 22nd!
Shilo Rousseau (25)
When predicting the future of the Canadian team prior to the 2023-2024 season it would have been easy to think that Shilo Rousseau was going to be a shoo in for the Senior teams. She was coming off of a spectacular close to the season with four top 20’s in the last six races including a career best finish of 11th in the final race of the season. Coming off of a Juniors career where her best finishes were in the 30’s and those were 4-5 years prior that was quite intriguing. But then she didn’t appear on the Senior roster at all in 2023-2024. As it turns out studying for medical school is tough business!
After no IBU level racing in the 23-24 season, the then 24 year old Shilo Rousseau put in big work and earned a spot on the World Cup roster for most of the 2024-2025 season. She also raced on the IBU Cup in Obertilliach and at the European Championships. At the European Championships she had her best racing of the season as she finished 35th in the Sprint and 24th in the Pursuit. While it didn’t quite match up to the level she had displayed at the close of the 22-23 season this was definitely more like it.
Doing our best apples-to-apples comparison to look at IBU Cup racing only we see that her shooting was pretty stable over the two seasons. She hit 84.4% in the 22-23 season that ended so strongly. She hit 83.8% in her IBU Cup racing last season. Pretty much no change. The skiing statistics are pretty intriguing too. She actually skied faster in the 24-25 running 0.2% faster than median compared to 0.7% slower than median in 22-23. On the World Cup last season her ski ranks were consistently in the 70’s and 80’s and she ran 4.2% slower than median.
I’m pretty optimistic about Shilo Rousseau. She’s coming off of a solid year and is now focused 100% on biathlon. This summer was her best to date. She showed some really good stuff when she came over to the US Summer Biathlon Championships which included the top Swiss women as well. She finished 6th in the Sprint and 2nd in the Mass Start with the 3rd best course time in each race. It was August on roller skis but that was the best performance she’s put out there yet and makes me pretty intrigued for this coming season. If that ski speed translates to the snow she’s in very good shape. It may be that now we are only just starting to see what Rousseau can do. With that skiing she showed this summer, plus a hit rate in the low 80’s or higher, she’s in a good position to easily have the best season of her career!
IBU Cup – While these women aren’t going to start the season on the World Cup, there is going to be an opening for them to get there and they can all make a challenge for the spot. Here is who starts the season on the IBU Cup:
– Emily Dickson
– Moira Green
– Quinn Morgan
– Gillian Gowling
Emily Dickson (28)
Ever since graduating from the Juniors to the Senior level Emily Dickson has been the classic woman caught in between. Some IBU Cup here, a little World Cup there, but never rarely more than a trimester at a time on any level. She’s really been the dividing line between the IBU Cup and the World Cup for the Canadian team. She seemed to make a case for the World Cup in the 23-24 season as she had three of the best six finishes of her World Cup career all at the Nove Mesto World Championships, including at 52nd in the Pursuit.
Last season, though, she was 100% on the IBU Cup with just nine races total run last season. She did have two of the best finishes of her career though, a 12th in the Geilo Sprint was her 2nd best ever finish, and 17th was her fourth best ever finish. Her average finish was 36th last year, which was fairly consistent with the last few seasons.
Checking out her statistics we see where the up and down comes from. While her skiing has been steady running just slightly faster than median on the IBU Cup and around 4-5% slower than median on the World Cup, it’s her shooting that’s inconsistent. One years she’s hitting in the low 70’s and the next in the mid 80’s. When she had her run of the best racing of her World Cup career in 23-24 she hit 85% and that’s what powered her.
With the retirement of Emma Lunder there is space for at least one more woman running on the World Cup. Can Kelsey Dickson make her claim this season? She’ll have a challenge if Shilo Rousseau is going to ski like she did this summer. It’s really about if Dickson can have her good shooting. It wouldn’t hurt to have see her skiing take another step forward. She’s been solid the last few seasons in skiing but another step forward would really help take her to another level. And she’s only 28! She could definitely find a new level of skiing especially with the new coaching staff. Let’s hope that’s exactly what happens!
Moira Green (21)
The very young Moira Green just turned 21 in September. She’s in the very early stages of her career and thus far has just eight Senior level races to her name. However, she definitely is somebody we should keep an eye out for this season. And if the Canadian team is going to send a full team to for the IBU Cup I find it hard to believe that Green won’t be part of it.
Over the last two seasons she has raced four times in each of the last two seasons. In each of those seasons she has put up a top 30 with a 22nd in the 23-24 season and a 27 last year. Interestingly both came in week 6 of the IBU Cup season after she made her IBU Cup season debut at the European Championships. As a Junior she had her best racing at the 2023 Youth Worlds when she finished 17th in the Sprint and 20th in the Pursuit. She followed that up with three top 35 finishes as she started the 23-24 season on the Junior Cup. She also added a 36th in the Mass 60 at the 2024 Junior Worlds and a 35th in the 2025 Junior Worlds.
As a Junior the strength of her racing was her skiing. While she only hit in the 60’s or low 70’s at best with her rifle. she was able to get those higher finishes with her skiing. She peaked running between 3-4% faster than median on the Juniors level.
As she has started her transition to the IBU Cup we’ve seen a really nice continued progression. It’s just limited racing but we can see some improvement. She went from 0.5% slower than median in 23-24 up to 0.4 % faster in the 24-25 season. Her course time rank average improved from 50th to 35th. In those four races on the IBU Cup last season she hit 81.4% of her shots as well. That’s far too small a sample size tot take too seriously though.
Moira Green’s trajectory looks to be going upward. I am very hopeful that we’ll see her more consistently on the IBU Cup this season and that the Canadian federation will prioritize increased racing for the continued development of their athletes. The skiing is getting better. The shooting showed signs of improvement last season. If she can keep that progression going including skiing closer to 1-1.5% faster than median on the IBU Cup, and hitting in the upper 70’s or better, then that’s all I need to see. That would be a successful season no matter what the results say. However, with those numbers we would undoubtedly see a pile more top 30-40’s.
Quinn Morgan (23)
Since making her IBU debut in the 2021-2022 season, Quinn Morgan has just ten total races to look at. She has raced three times on the IBU Cup, all of which came in her debut season. She then raced seven times on the Junior Cup in the 2022-2023 season. So it’s been two full seasons since we saw her race. She finished with a career best 42nd in the 2023 Junior Worlds Individual. As a Junior she was a decent skier and she hit 65%. But now, having not seen her in two years I have no idea what to expect from her! Let’s just see what she brings!
Ema Chlepkova (22)
Ema Chlepkova may be a year older than Moira Green but she’s much earlier in her development curve. Entering this season she’s run only three seasons and a total of 15 races all of which have been on the Juniors. Thus far her career best is 26th, but shalso has three separate 29th place finishes including in the Individual at the 2025 Junior Worlds.
The great news for Chlepkova is that her shooting is getting better ever season. She started her Juniors career hitting 63.3%. She improved that to 72.5% in 23-24 and then 80% with perfectly even splits last season. Her skiing, though, has been stuck a little bit in neutral. When looking at her Junior Worlds finishes, the comparison against the best Juniors competition, her average course time rank hasn’t changed much at all. From course time ranks of 54th and 63rd in the 22-23 season to 46th, 26th, and 54th last year. That’s not much different at all.
While Chlepkova may be graduating out of the Juniors this season we can be optimistic that she’s ready to keep up the improvement. Her shooting has been basically a linear improvement every season. To expect her to get to the upper 80’s this season is probably a bit too much to hope. But getting into the low to mid 80’s is certainly possible. Hopefully she’s all set to get the skiing going this season as well!
Janice Grundahl (25)
Janice Grundahl has followed the more traditional North American pathway coming to biathlon a little later than Europeans normally would. Grundahl came to it just too late to run on the Junior Cup. She instead made her IBU biathlon debut on the IBU Cup in the first trimester of the 2022-2023 season. She made steady progress and by the end of the season set a career best of 13th in Canmore that still stands as her career best today. In total she had five top 40’s in 11 races that season. Since then in nine more IBU Cup races over the last two seasons she had two top 40’s with her best finishes coming last season. Last year in just five races she finished 36th in the European Championships Individual and 38th in the Ridnaun-Val Ridanna Mass 60.
Grundahl has turned herself into quite a shooter. In her first season she hit 86.3%. She backed that up with an 84% the following year and in her five races last season she hit 92.5%. With shooting like that you might expect sensational results. She’s skiing about 5% slower than median with average course time ranks in the 60’s.
Grundahl is a very solid shooter. It’s more than enough to be competitive. For now it’s all about the skiing. If the skiing comes along to move closer to median on the IBU Cup she can earn more consistent starts. That’s the big thing to watch for her this season.
Juniors – And then we have the Juniors who are going to be fighting to surprise us!
Cheyenne Tirschman (17)
– 2024-2025 was Cheyenne Tirschman’s debut season. She raced at Youth Worlds.
– Youth Worlds: 33rd, 21st, and 32nd
– Her best moment was probably in the Mixed relays. In the Mixed Relay Tirschman played a big role with her 5th best leg 2. She pulled the team up from 10th to 8th and got the team in range for the men to bring them up further.
– Course Time Ranks: 14th, 17th, and 12th
– Shooting percentages: 90%, 60%, and 65%. The year prior he hit 80% which was pretty consistent.
Flora Csonka (18)
– 2024-2025 was Flora Csonka’s second season of racing. She last raced in 2022-2023 with four races. She raced Youth Worlds in 24-25
– Youth Worlds: 26th, 70th, and 46th
– Career Best Moment: The 26th in the Youth Worlds Individual was a huge career best from her previous best finish of 63rd.
– Course Time Ranks: 48th, 53rd, and 42nd. This was a BIG jump from 22-23 when she was usually inthe 70’s and 80’s in course time rank.
– Shooting percentages: 90%, 60%, and 65%. The year prior he hit 80% which was pretty consistent.
Alexandra Hulshof (20)
– 2024-2025 was Alexandra Hulshoff’s fourth season of racing. After a full season of racing in 2023-2024 it was only Junior Worlds for her in 24-25.
– Junior Worlds: 43rd, 59th, 48th
– Career Best Moments: 43rd at the 2025 Oestersund Junior Worlds was just shy of her career best but considering the competition it was the best race of her career.
– Course Time Ranks: 53rd, 64th, and 43rd. Roughly in line with where she has been throughout her career.
– Shooting percentages: 85%, 80%, and 65%. She’s hitting better than that in recent seasons.
Men – The men continue to fight hard. Adam Runnalls continues to serve as the leader of the squad. After him there is a long list of young men fighting to make the top spot. It’s a seriously young squad but they have spirit! Just last season they fought hard and grabbed that top 20 position right at the end of the season.
Head Coach: Andrew Chisholm & Helene Joergensen
2024-2025 Nations Cup Rank: 20th
2024-2025 Relay Finishes: 22nd, 21st, 17th, 18th, 17th, and 18th
Quota: 3 Men to Start
World Cup – To start out the season we’ll see Adam Runnalls joined by Logan Pletz and Jasper Fleming. After Runnalls there will likely be some turn over but we’ll see. With only three starters it gets tough for them to fight back up the Nations Cup rankings but we know they’ll try!
Adam Runnalls (27)
When Adam Runnalls joined the men’s Canadian World Cup squad he was joining a team that was still only a few seasons removed from the all time best men’s relay finish in their history and just one year out from their 2nd best ever finish. Along with the Gow brothers and a rotating cast of others he was part of a second very good run of relay finishes including a 5th place finish in Antholz in the 2021-2022 season, the 3rd best ever finish for the Canadian men in a relay. In those earlier years in his career it wasn’t unusual to see them regularly in the top 10 in the men’s relay.
Since then, though, there his been an exodus from the Canadian men’s national team and Adam Runnalls is really the last man left standing. While others are trying to join him on a regular basis it’s really Adam Runnalls that’s holding strong for the Canadian men on the World Cup as the only consistent starter on this level.
Adam Runnalls has certainly been steady. He did reach 38th Overall in the 2022-2023 season when he eight top 40’s, six top 30’s and two top 20’s. He matched that two top 20’s again in the 23-24 season but had two fewer top 30’s. And last year he totaled just three top 40’s as his Overall rank slipped to 61st Overall.
While those seem like pretty big changes it really just highlights the narrow gaps that exist in men’s biathlon. Only small changes make the difference between finishing inside the points or just outside the points. For Adam Runnalls that’s really all it was. His skiing is basically flat over the last three seasons. In each of the last four seasons he’s skied between 0.7% and 1.2% slower than median. That’s put his average course time ranks consistently in the low 50’s. His shooting meanwhile is always in the low 80’s. Since hitting above 80% for the first time in 2022-2023 he’s been between 80.7% and 82.7%.
| Prone % | Standing % | Total % | Shooting Time | |
| 2020-2021 | 84 | 72.8 | 78.4 | 27 |
| 2021-2022 | 87.5 | 65 | 76.3 | 26.2 |
| 2022-2023 | 81.8 | 83.6 | 82.7 | 23.2 |
| 2023-2024 | 85.9 | 75.5 | 80.7 | 23.8 |
| 2024-2025 | 82 | 81 | 81.5 | 23.3 |
As I said above Adam Runnalls is a steady presence. Minimal variation in his performance the last three to four seasons. At only 27 years old (he definitely feels like he should be like 32 right?!?) he absolutely has the ability to continue to improve. There is a very good chance that he hasn’t peaked out his ski performance. Hopefully the new coaching team with Andrew Chilsholm and Helene Joergensen holds the key to unlocking that. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that this is the first time that we see that new level of performance.
Jasper Fleming (20)
Jasper Fleming may have only been 19 years old last year, but at that young age he still made the jump to the Senior levels as he ran the first trimester on the IBU Cup and then made three starts on the World cup in the 2nd trimester. He closed out the year with the Junior Worlds. Prior to all of that though, he raced on the Juniors in 2022-2023 and 2023-2024. He had a fantastic race at the 2024 Youth Worlds finishing 8th in the Sprint just 8 seconds back of Grzegorz Galica who we know has gone on to do really impressive things last season.
Last season on the IBU Cup Fleming didn’t have massive success, but then again he was 19 years old. He did finish with two top 60’s. At Junior Worlds he had a big accident in the Individual, flew off the course and into a fence. The crash broke his rifle and he couldn’t finish the race. It also threw him off for the Sprint and the Mixed Relay. So certainly not a fair measure of his talent and potential.
Fleming actually shows pretty good ski potential. On Youth Worlds in 2024 he finished with course time ranks of 13th and 16th in the Sprint and Mass 60. Last season as a 19 year old on the IBU Cup he had an average course time rank of 67th as he skied a little back of median. His shooting could absolutely stand to improve a little hit. After hitting 72% at the 2024 Youth Worlds he hit 63.8% on the IBU Cup last season and 75% in three World Cup races. Maybe breaking his rifle was what he needed?
I’m very optimistic about Jasper Fleming’s potential. He’s shown some of the best skiing we’ve seen from a young Canadian recently (along with one of his teammates we’ll cover shortly). If he can keep that skiing coming along as he grows up to match the potential he’s showing now, and he continues to make strides with his shooting (including with his new rifle!), Jasper Fleming could be part of the next generation of World Cup athletes for the Canadians. He’s definitely on my short list already. I’m going to be watching him very closely over the next few seasons.
Logan Pletz (24)
One of the many young men who is making the efforts to join Adam Runnalls on the World Cup for Team Canada is Logan Pletz. Last year he was actually the second most frequent teammate with Runnalls as he raced 13 times on the World Cup which surpassed the 12 total races he had run in his career prior to last season. This included many of his career best finishes including his first two top 60’s.
Earlier in his career, when he was spending more time on the IBU Cup, he was a regular finisher in the top 30. He had nine of those finishes in the 2022-2023 and 2023-2024 seasons. This included a career best IBU Cup finish of 14th. He also has a career best Juniors finish of 14th in the 2022 Junior World Championship Individual.
You may have become aware of Logan Pletz’s interest in rifle design. If you haven’t defiitely go ahead and listen to our two interviews with Pletz on the podcast including this summer when he discussed starting his own design company where he is now designing and 3D printing biathlon rifles. It’s really fascinating. It’s not surprising then that his shooting has been improving year over year. He’s up from 74.4% two seasons ago to 78.8% in 23-24 and then to 82.2% last season. As he’s dialed in his rifle design his accuracy is getting better so clearly something is working!
Meanwhile, last seaon was the fastest of his career as well. He’s never shown superb speed in his career, but last year he was up to 3.9% slower than median with an average course time rank of 78th. Each of those the best of his World Cup career. Back in the 2022-2023 season he did run 1.5% faster than median on the IBU Cup though. That was as a 21 year old, so hopefully that is a sign of a higher peak level of skiing that he can find.
With no other obvious candidate to claim a World Cup spot (and Olympic spot) Logan Pletz seems to profile very strongly into that role. He’s a solid shooter and hopefully a little faster this season. Frankly I would be surprised if he wasn’t there all season long. If that happens, though, hopefully it’s because the other men came up and grabbed the spot rather than Pletz regressing. I very strongly believe, though, that this will be Pletz’s best season. From all sounds he is very comfortable with his rifle set up and shooting better than ever. If his skiing with the cows is working out (listen to the pod!) then hopefully the ski speed is ready to advance as well!
IBU Cup – While not on the World Cup we’ll hopefully see a host of young men fighting on the IBU Cup. From here they can fight hard to earn that World Cup and possibly an Olympic position! Here’s who will start the year for the Canadians on the IBU Cup this season:
– Matthew Strum
– Zachary Connelly
– Malcolm McCulloch
– Ryan Elden
Zachary Connelly (24)
Another 24 year old who has a little World Cup experience over the last few seasons is Zachary Connelly. In the last three campaigns he’s raced 11 times on the World Cup with four top 60’s and a career best of 49th. Meanwhile he has 22 IBU Cup races with nine top 30’s and 13 top 40’s. Only one of those came last season though. To be fair it was only in four races though.
It’s been tough for Connelly with such starts and stops in his racing. And unfortunately when he’s gotten the opportunities he’s hasn’t always been able to capitalize on them. His skiing had at best not advanced significantly in the last three seasons. He’s skiing anywhere from 3-6% back of median on the World Cup with average course time ranks in the 70’s the last two seasons. On the IBU Cup his average ski ranks have dipped from 23rd two seasons ago back to 50th last season as he’s gone from 1.9% faster than median to 0.6% slower. His shooting also has been scattered between the mid 70’s and low 80% ranges.
To be quite fair to Connelly on two points: 1) these analyses are on pretty small sample sizes and 2) it has to be difficult with such inconsistency the last few seasons. There is no way to really build a good feeling. So it’s both that when given the opportunity he hasn’t jumped on it, but also the management has been tricky for him.
My hope for Connelly this season is simply consistent racing. World Cup or IBU Cup I don’t care. Just a full season of health and consistent racing. Hopefully then he can start stacking successes. Shooting in the low 80’s and skiing either a little faster than median on the IBU Cup or within 2% of the median on the World Cup is a good year no matter what the results.
Malcolm McCulloch (19)
Junior Malcom McCulloch makes a surprise run to the IBU Cup. We actually only saw him for the first time last season at Youth Worlds. This is what we saw:
– 2024-2025 was Malcolm Mcculloch’s debut as he raced at Youth Worlds
– Junior Worlds: 42nd, 27th, and 34th
– Course Time Ranks: 39th, 49th, and 41st
– Shooting percentages: 70%, 80%, and 65%
Matthew Strum (29)
Between the 2018-2019 and 2021-2022 seasons Matthew Strum was a consistent competitor for Biathlon Canada on the IBU Cup including racing 16 times in the 2021-2022 season alone. He actually showed a bit of spark that year with two top 20 finishes and finishing in the points seven times. Since then though we’ve only seen him eight total times with four appearances in each of the last two seasons. Interestingly both of those appearances were the European Championships and the week 6 of the season. Last year he had some success with two top 50’s in Ridnaun-Val Ridanna.
At times Strum has proven to be at times solid shooter hitting in the low 80’s including 79.3% in that 2021-2022 season. He hit 85% in his four races last season. He struggles with the skiing though running well back of average with average ski ranks consistently in the 70’s or higher. I am excited to see Strum back though and hopefully this is a sign that he’s made some skiing gains. Hopefully he can get in the points a few times.
Ryan Elden (26)
Ryan Elden used a very strong opening Sprint at the Canadian National Team Trials to push his way back into international racing for the first time since the 2022-2023 season. The 26 year old has not been seen a lot of late racing just 10 times since the 2019-2020 season. Unfortunately, thus far he hasn’t had a ton of success. He did have four top 60’s in his last four IBU Cup races which are his best career finishes on that level. Unfortunately those were the IBU Cup races in Canmore to close the 22-23 season with very limited fields. Those top 60’s he finished in the last five spots.
The good thing about Elden is that he’s a reasonably decent shooter and the performances at Canadian Trials proved that once again. However, he did show a bit better speed this time than he has previously. We’ll see how he is able to perform once he gets to the IBU Cup later this month. Unfortunately not a lot of guys who were pushing him out of the way. Not to be a downer but I do think that it’s possible that Elden’s position goes to Luke Hulshof in the second trimester.
Haldan Borglum (26)
The 2023-2024 season was the best season of Haldan Borglum’s senior career to date. That season he raced 13 total times on the IBU and World Cup and had five of his nine best career IBU Cup finishes including tying his career best of 33rd in the Sjusjøen Mass 60 that season. Interestingly his other 33rd place finish came in a Mass 60 as well.
He started out last season on the World Cup but after racing in Kontiolahti and Hochfilzen he finished the year with just three more races including one IBU Cup race and the World Championships. In my opinion Borglum, along with Connelly, is a perfect example of a Canadian athlete who has been let down by the choice of the Canadian federation to significantly limit the number of senior men they ran in Europe last season. Rather than being exposed to another year of racing and an opportunity to push and measure himself against the best. It’s unfortunate and, while there is no way of proving it, would seemingly limit his ability to continue to improve. I understand the significant financial limitations that the Canadians operate under. It’s a frustrating situation and I wish there was some way to solve it immediately because the athletes suffer the consequences.
With such limited racing the last few years it’s hard to get a handle on where his performance is. He certainly runs well back of the median on the World Cup. In his limited World Cup racing he has come closer to median but still has course time ranks in the 80’s on a regular basis. On the IBU Cup he runs about 4% back of median which gives him IBU Cup course times in the 60’s. The good news is though that his shooting has been improving significantly. After hitting 56.7% in the 2021-2022 season he has advanced to 64% the following year and 78.7% in 2023-2024. In limited World Cup racing last season that was even up to 84.3%. If that’s real and reproducible over the long run that’s good enough to compete.
For the sake of Borglum, as well as the rest of the men on this list, I hope that Canadians are running a full slate on the Senior circuits this season. They could use the competition. If he can really hit in the mid 80’s that’s a start. Every little bit of ski improvement after that would be fantastic. Let’s just keep our fingers crossed and hope that we see a lot of Haldan Borglum this season!
Gavin Johnston (22)
Last season was Gavin Johnston’s last in which he could race as a Junior. So of course he raced three IBU Cup level races along with a single Juniors race. In his three seasons of Juniors races he raced 12 Junior Cup races and had just three top 70 finishes. He skied slower than median with average ski time ranks usually between 70’s and 90’s. While that’s been not where we want to see it his shooting at least has been consistently around 80%.
He did run three IBU Cup level races including two at the European Championships where he finished 89th and 100th and then a Sprint in Ridnaun-Val Ridanna where he finished 71st. In those races his ski time ranks were again in the back portion of the field but he did hit 82.5% overall.
Hopefully Johnston has a solid season of development. I’m happy to see his shooting taking steps forward. Hopefully he can advance that skiing as well!
Juniors – And then we have the Juniors who are going to be fighting to surprise us!
Luke Hulshoff (19)
-2024-2025 was Luke Hulshoff’s debut and he raced at Youth Worlds
– Junior Worlds: 33rd, 8th, and 9th
– It’s worth mentioning that he played a BIG role in getting the Mixed Relay team to 4th and the Youth Men’s Relay team to 5th. In both of those races he once again showcased significant ski potential. In the Mixed Relay he was just 0.6 seconds from the fastest ski time on the anchor leg and in the Men’s Relay he had the third best couse time behind only Leo Gundersen and Leo Carlier and he had the best anchor leg in the field.
– Course Time Ranks: 9th, 13th, and 14th
– Shooting percentages: 60%, 80%, and 75%
– Luke Hulshoff has magnificent potential for this team and has all the makeup of a future leader for this team.
Jean-Nicolas De Broeck (20)
-2024-2025 was Jean-Nicolas De Broeck’s fourth season of racing. He raced Junior Worlds for the first time in his career as he graduated from Youth to Juniors.
– Junior Worlds: 40th, 65th, and 29th
– Career Best Moments: 10th at the 2023 Youth Worlds Pursuit, 11th at the 2024 Youth Worlds Mass 60, and 13th at the 2024 Youth Worlds Individiaul
– Course Time Ranks: 32nd, 47th, 44th. This was down from where he was at the Youth Worlds where he was 22nd, 39th, and 14th.
– Shooting percentages: 80%, 40%, and 70%