France took its first gold of the Sochi Olympics Monday when Martin Fourcade won the biathlon pursuit but Norwegian legend Ole Einar Bjoerndalen narrowly missed out on an outright Winter Games medals record.
Bjoerndalen started the race equal with Norwegian cross country ski great Bjoern Daehlie on the all-time record of 12 medals won for the Winter Olympics.
But despite showing good ski speed, Bjoerndalen missed targets in the second prone and both standing shootings to come in fourth in 34:14.5 just 1.7sec behind France's Jean Guillaume Beatrix in third.
Fourcade, who took his first gold to add to his silver in the mass start at Vancouver in 2010, dominated the race from the mid-stage and even had the time to clench his first in triumph after a clear final shooting.
He finished in 33:48.6, 14.1sec ahead of Ondrej Moravec of the Czech Republic who came in second for silver.
France took its first gold of the Sochi Olympics Monday when Martin Fourcade won the biathlon pursuit but Norwegian legend Ole Einar Bjoerndalen narrowly missed out on an outright Winter Games medals record.
Bjoerndalen started the race equal with Norwegian cross country ski great Bjoern Daehlie on the all-time record of 12 medals won for the Winter Olympics.
But despite showing good ski speed, Bjoerndalen missed targets in the second prone and both standing shootings to come in fourth in 34:14.5 just 1.7sec behind France’s Jean Guillaume Beatrix in third.
Fourcade, who took his first gold to add to his silver in the mass start at Vancouver in 2010, dominated the race from the mid-stage and even had the time to clench his first in triumph after a clear final shooting.
He finished in 33:48.6, 14.1sec ahead of Ondrej Moravec of the Czech Republic who came in second for silver.
