Marte Olsbu Roeiseland went wire to wire to give Norway another gold medal at the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics Sunday night. The Norwegian dominated in the women’s 10km pursuit at the Zhangjiakou National Biathlon Centre. Elvira Oeberg of Sweden regained her start position taking the silver, while Roeiseland’s teammate Tiril Eckhoff came in for the bronze as a surprise.
The medalists from the sprint were first to go out on the course during snowy and windy conditions at the Chinese mountainside. The top 60 finishers followed them out and chase their way to a new set of medals while trying to avoid penalties from missed shots. Five laps of 2kms, with four visits of shooting with two prone and two standing positions, were necessary to complete before crossing the finish line.
Roeiseland was first to leave, followed by Oeberg and Wierer, who came in 31 seconds and 37 seconds respectively from their sprint times. With brand new snow falling on the ground, many of the best biathletes felt improvements in how they traveled around the course. Roeiseland was in for her first test in the prone position and went clean. Oeberg and Wierer both went clean as well, sitting 32 and 37 seconds back of the Norwegian in that order.
In the second shoot, Roeiseland came in alone once again and went clean just as Oeberg and Wierer arrived. The Swede missed one while the Italian went clean, picking up second while Oeberg did a 150-meter lap. Austria's Lia Theresa Hauser earned up a chance to overtake Oeberg, sitting nine seconds back of third place.
Roeiseland was in for the first of two standing shoots, missing her first but would have time chewed off from her lead. Wierer missed two that opened the door for Oeberg, who also missed two. Everyone behind them missed at least once, leaving the standings for the top two unchanged, with Hauser moving into third.
Roeiseland’s lead was 1:33 on the Italian, earning a good margin for her to miss at least two on the final visit to the range. Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold overtook Hauser for third on the course, making it a tight race for the bronze medal. Roeiseland managed to go perfect with the range all to herself and left with the gold medal all but sealed. Wierer was in while the rest of the pack arrived and missed one in the process. Tandrevold went perfect and moved into third behind Oeberg, who managed to regain second place.
At the finish line, Roeiseland found herself gaining another gold medal with a time of 34:46.9. Oeberg realized that she was well ahead of Tandrevold and scored the silver, coming in 1:36 later. In a complete surprise, Tandrevold was no longer behind the Swede, as she struggled to finish the race. Coming into third was Eckhoff 1:48 later which was a shock to many, wondering what happened to the Norwegian. She was spotted coming into the finish line and crossed in 14th.
The 25-year-old was completely out of gas on the last climb of the course and couldn’t keep her pace.
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