The biathlon is a winter sport that combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. It is treated as a race, with contestants skiing through a cross-country trail whose distance is divided into shooting rounds. The shooting rounds are not timed per se, but depending on the competition, missed shots result in extra distance or time being added to the contestant's total.
Ole Einar Bjørndalen is a retired Norwegian professional biathlete and coach, often referred to by the nickname, the "King of Biathlon". With 13 Winter Olympic Games medals, he is second on the list of multiple medalists behind Marit Bjørgen who has won 15 medals. He is also the most successful biathlete of all time at the Biathlon World Championships, having won 45 medals. With 95 World Cup wins, Bjørndalen is ranked first all-time for career victories on the Biathlon World Cup tour. He has won the Overall World Cup title six times, in 1997–98, in 2002–03, in 2004–05, in 2005–06, in 2007–08 and in 2008–09.
Tomasz Sikora is a former Polish biathlete.
Sven Fischer is a former German biathlete. He trained with the WSV Oberhof 05 club, and was coached by Frank Ullrich and Fritz Fischer and Klaus Siebert. After the 2006/07 biathlon season, he retired.
Ricco Groß is a former German biathlete. He is one of the most successful biathletes of all time at the Winter Olympics and the World Championships.
Ilmārs Bricis is a former Latvian biathlete, who has participated in six Winter Olympics from 1992 to 2010.
Vincent Defrasne is a former French biathlete. He won a gold medal in the 12.5 km pursuit at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin and a bronze medal in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Michael Greis is a former German biathlete.
Halvard Hanevold was a Norwegian biathlete.
Egil Gjelland is a former Norwegian biathlete. He is olympic champion in the biathlon relay from the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.
Patrick Favre is a former Italian biathlete. At the Biathlon World Championships 1997 in Osrblie he won a bronze medal with the Italian relay team. Two years later at the Biathlon World Championships 1999 in Kontiolahti he won a silver medal in the sprint event. In the 1994–95 season he came second in the overall World Cup behind Jon Åge Tyldum. After the 2000–01 season, he retired as biathlete, though he had a short-lived comeback during the 2003–04 season. Following his retirement, he became a coach, spending seven years with the Italian national biathlon team before joining the French national men's biathlon team in June 2018 on a four-year contract.
Vladimir Petrovich Drachev is a former Soviet, Russian and Belarusian biathlete. He formerly had Russian citizenship and started for Russia until 2002. Drachev has four world championship titles in his career. He also has two olympic relay medals for Russia. During his career he took a total of 11 World Championship medals and 15 World Cup race wins. He was also known as one of the fastest shots in the sport whilst competing.
Vadim Leonidovich Sashurin is a former Soviet and Belarusian biathlete and current coach. In the lead-up to the 2002–03 season, Sashurin was caught using the banned steroid nandrolone. He was initially banned for 15 months, but the ban was extended to 24 months after Sashurin failed to take part in an anti-doping campaign, as mandated by the IBU.
Oleg Vladimirovich Ryzhenkov is a former Belarusian biathlete.
Zdeněk Vítek is a Czech former biathlete. Vítek retired from the sport at the end of the 2013–14 season. In May 2014, he was named as the head coach for the Czech Republic's women's biathlon team. After four years in this role, in June 2018 Vitek became head coach of the Czech men's team.
Kaisa Leena Mäkäräinen is a Finnish former world-champion and 3-time world-cup-winning biathlete, who currently competes for Kontiolahden Urheilijat. Outside sports, Mäkäräinen is currently studying to be a Physics teacher at the University of Eastern Finland in Joensuu. Her team coach is Jonne Kähkönen, while Jarmo Punkkinen is her ski coach.
Christoph "Sumi" Sumann is a former Austrian biathlete.
Lowell Bailey is an American biathlon coach and retired biathlete who competed from 2001 until 2018.
Tarjei Bø is a Norwegian professional biathlete. Awarded Olympic gold medals, World Championship gold medals and World Cup victories from 2010 to 2022. Bø debuted in the Biathlon World Cup on 26 March 2009 in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia. In the 2010 Winter Olympics, he earned his first gold medal in the 4 × 7.5 km biathlon relay. On 10 December 2010 he won the World Cup sprint race in Hochfilzen, his first world cup victory. He also won the following pursuit race and anchored the winning relay team. Bø is the older brother of biathlete Johannes Thingnes Bø.
Tiril Kampenhaug Eckhoff is a Norwegian former biathlete.
