February 12, 2016 (Presque Isle, Me) – American Susan Dunklee, followed up her Sprint silver with an outstanding fifth-place finish in the women’s 10km Pursuit as Gabriela Soukalova (Czech) continued with her winning ways with an impressive 34-second victory on a cold and blustery Friday afternoon in Presque Isle at round 8 of the BMW Biathlon IBU World Cup.

Finland’s Kaisa Makarainen started the race in fifth and used fast skiing in her second two loops to move into second at the finish while France’s Marie Dorin Habert overtook Polish skier Krystyna Guzik in the final leg to claim the final podium spot despite four misses in the first standing.

“Starting near the front of a pursuit offers lots of opportunity but also can create a lot more pressure,” said Dunklee. “What I think I did well today was setting aside yesterday’s result and what it meant, and redirecting my focus on what I needed to do to perform well today.”

Maine native and another crowd favourite, Clare Egan jumped nine positions from thirty-second a day ago to twenty-third. Egan shot well, going clean in the first prone and an single miss in each of the following shootings.

Hanah Dreissigacker finished just 7.6 seconds behind Egan in twenty-fourth position with only three misses as well while Canada’s Zina Kocher started in forty-second position and finished in forty-sixth with five misses on the day.

Weather conditions – cold temperatures and strong winds were a considerable factor on all of the athletes all day. Temperatures hovered around -18 all afternoon, and northwest  winds put a bite into that. Inside the shooting area, the strong winds swirled and made shooting a challenge for all. Only one athlete in the top ten – Kaia Nicolaisen of Norway had just two misses, while the rest had three or more.

Italy’s Dorothea Wierer briefly took the race lead after the third loop, but that was the only time Soukalova was out of top position. She quickly regained her form, cleaning the final standing while Wierer had three missed targets, as Soukalova soloed in again for another World Cup victory.

Soukalova shot clean in the first two prone stages, but had troubles in the first standing with three misses. “I was not concentrated for the shooting for the shooting (first standing). My legs started to shake and I was afraid of the wind. Sometimes that happens. I was happy for the last shooting.”

When asked about her experience in Presque Isle, Soukalova beamed. “It is awesome. It is nice to sit here again. It is a small place here and I am not the type of human who realizes the people are here so it helped me.”

Makarainen shot clean in the final standing to hold onto the silver position, finishing the day with three misses. “I am happy to be in the podium,” explained Makarainen, “I am healthy again and I took some time to train well again. It was long and difficult in the middle of the season but I am feeling good for the championships.”

Habert mentioned that she felt fatigued yesterday with jet lag and all the travel, but was better today. “The temperature was hard today, it was hard on the hand and foot and I am not used to the temperature. Even with the penalties, the coach told me I was within a few seconds to the podium.” Habert chased down Guzik, who was third yesterday but slipped to fourth despite only three misses on the range, as Habert charged to finish just 4.8 seconds behind Makarainen.

Dunklee held second after the first and second loops with a clean shoot in the first and a single miss in the second prone, but dropped to sixth with two misses in the first standing. A single miss in the second standing had her back in medal contention as she improved to fourth, but fatigue set in and she dropped back to fifth, being overtaken by Guzik on the last lap.

“As a women’s team, we put together one of our strongest showings of all time, and I am very excited to fight with these ladies for strong performance in tomorrow’s relay.”

Rounding out the top six was Veronica Vitkova of the  Czech team with an improvement from tenth a day ago on the strength of strong skiing and only three misses.

Weather conditions are also impacting the schedule for the events at the venue, as the men’s 4×7.5 km relay time will be moved up 14:20 on Saturday afternoon. The women’s 4×6 km which was originally scheduled to be held at 12:10 on Sunday, will be moved to 16:20 on Saturday afternoon.

Sunday’s weather looks to be substantially colder and windier in Presque Isle and both the IBU and race organizers decided that moving the time would be a wiser move for the well being of the athletes, volunteers, and fans.

Results here.