I am not sure what forum to post this in so I have put it in a few.

I have recently become intrigued with the biathlon sport. There is a club here in Maine and I am going to go to the next event they have.

I love shooting and my wife and kids and I have just started cross country skiing. I don't want to seriously compete as I am way to old (37) but I would love to get good enough to show up in a oldster/masters friendly competition and have some fun. I can shoot and I am in pretty good shape (I run marathons) so I think this is realistic for me.

I would love this to be a sport that my kids get into. I really appreciate the combination of max cardio output and then having to slow yourself down long enough to shoot a clean set and then back you go!


I have searched the forum and I found a few posts about biathlon rifles but nothing recent. I guess Anchutz is the leader in the field with Izmash coming up second. I would love to see some of the rigs that get shot out there.

Due to the fact that this is a underutilized sport in the USA there is very little in the way of information out there.

Any info (links, web sites ect)about the Biathlon, the equipment and the rules of the sport will be greatly appreciated.

THANKS

Try this


www.biathlonusa.com

Hi Honkey,

don't consider yourself too old too quickly! I started biathlon at age 44, and I wasn't running marathons at the time (nor now). I started it because it was something to keep me fit during the winter months, which eventually I figured would help me during sheep season.

Well, it started to get a momentum of its own. I race, and take it very seriously! I don't think I have ever trained harder consistently than over the last summer (not counting a few misspent years at university when I spent three hours a day at the gym). We joke around and have fun at the master's races, but we race hard too. At least some do. :-)

As for info on rifles, have a look at this website: http://www.altiusguns.com/. I met the owner a few times, he's a nice guy, hunter, and former biathlete. I ended buying an Izhmash through him, with a custom stock.

I have only one regret about biathlon, and that is that I didn't start doing it long ago (which in my case was rather difficult until I moved to Canada, on account of hardly ever having snow, nor biathlon clubs where I lived back then).

Frans

The "Life" was taken out of Biatholon when centrefire was removed. I understand range set-up problems, etc, but for me, that still doesn't justify destroying the sport as it was set up originally.

If by "life" you mean enormous increase in number of participants, growth in number of biathlon ranges and tremendous popularity as a spectator sport in Europe, I'd argue that life was put INTO the sport by switching to rimfire.

But I don't argue your point that the origin of the sport was different.

Frans