The Penalty Loop Biathlon Podcast

Interview with Matthias Ahrens, part 1

In this episode, we talked with Matthias Ahrens, former head coach of the Canadian Biathlon team, and currently coaching a new generation of Canadian biathletes at the Biathlon Alberta Training Centre. Part one covers his introduction, biathlon coaching and our usual questions.
 
You can find more information about Matthias through the following links:
https://biathlon.ca/biathlon-alberta-training-center/coaching-staff/
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335878529_Can_performance_in_biathlon_world_cup_be_predicted_by_performance_analysis_of_biathlon_IBU_cup
We hope you enjoy it!
 

Interview with Kristian Wulff

We had the absolute pleasure of chatting with Kristian Wulff from Denmark about biathlon in his home country, biathlon venues, broadcasting, analysis, the IBU family, team collaboration, athletes and much more. Please join us in this interesting conversation, and send your feedback to penaltylooppodcast@gmail.com or reach out to us on Twitter.
Follow Kristian's Studio .22 Podcast or reach out to him on Twitter.

Egil Gjelland Interview #1

This is our first of will hopefully be many interviews with Egil Gjelland. We covered a lot!
00:00 Intro to interview
5:43 Egil joins
19:00 https://skjelbreidpoiree.com/
25:00 Czech Women Training Camp update
39:20 Davidova?
43:55 Fun time
59:30 Future of biathlon. See https://vismaskiclassics.com for more info on what RJ and Egil are talking about 

Mid May Catch Up

Just a little catchup on the biathlon news of May 2022 plus we check out the new W.E.I.S.E. stat from of course, our very own RJ Weise. You're definitely going to want to hear about about this! 

Baiba Bendika Interview

Episode 2 of our off season program takes us Through the Eyes of: Baiba Bendika. Once again we set out to learn what life is like on for an athlete on the IBU World Cup. Along the way we learn a lot of really fun things like the meaning behind her tattoo, her recent favorite tv show, and why other athletes are jealous of her when they travel. You don't want to miss this one!

Scott Gow Interview

This week we are transitioning to our summer program and we start with our first episode of "Through the Eyes of" featuring Scott Gow! We cover a HUGE amount in this episode including, his background, the life of a biathlete on the World Cup, who is the most fun at parties, a deep discussion on analytics in biathlon, and more!

The Season Review

We got together this week to take a look back on the season 2021-2022 season in a bit of a unique way. We start by looking at some of the most improved athletes of the season. Then we look at some of our favorite races of the year. Then we briefly discuss some of the highs and lows of the season. We finish up with two part Stat of the Week to discuss some new tools RJ created to help us analyze the last several years of the World Cup racing and this season in particular!

Post Oslo

We are back for another lengthy discussion on a week in the world of biathlon! We start off with a brief discussion on our joy of a return to Oslo before discussing in depth the races of the weekend. We hit the season ending version of the Power Rankings. Then we discuss an Under the Radar athlete from Norway who is making himself quite well known and an Up and Comer for Team Germany that will hopefully follow the same path. We dive DEEEEP into the Linn Persson/Elvira Oeberg Mass Start finish. And we finish up with a really interesting discussion on RJ's work with stats for Youth/Junior and IBU Cup athletes to help us identify up and comers. Please join us for a fun one!

Post Otepaeae

It's time for another Penalty Loop Podcast as we review the racing from the past weekend in Otepaeae. We start off by going through the races and discussing the top athletes and other take aways from each race. We dive into this week's Penalty Loop Power Rankings including discussing several new additions and a new #1 on the women's side. We discuss two under the radar athletes including one VERY under the radar athlete and Karolina Knotten as well. Our Up and Comers this week are two young Ukranian women who made their World Cup debuts this week. And in the General Topic we hit on a number of topics including the final take aways from Otepaeae, the Athletes Committee, and more retirements. Come join us!

Post Kontiolahti Podcast

The Penalty Loop Podcast is back. We start with a wide ranging opening discussion about the world of biathlon before jumping into a look back at the week of racing in Kontiolahti. We follow that up with a discussion of this week's Penalty Loop Power Rankings. From there we move on to a discussion on an under the radar athlete, Jessica Jislova, and an up and comer, Stina Nilsson. We also do a little look at some of the best performers at the recently concluded Junior World Championships. We finish up with a discussion of some of the big topics in biathlon over the last week including 1) The Stina Nilsson hype, 2) The French DQ in the women's relay, and 3) Sadly more retirements