While Quentin Fillon Maillet missed out on making Winter Olympics history due to an uncharacteristically bad shooting effort, Johannes Thingnes Boe was too good for the rest of the competition in the 15km mass start to win for his fourth gold medal..
Johannes Thingnes Boe 2022 Winter Olympics
Norway set a new Winter Olympic record with 15 medals because to Johannes Thingnes Boe triumph; he now has five. Martin Ponsiluoma of Sweden earned silver, and Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen of Denmark took bronze.
After collecting two golds and three silvers, Fillon Mallet finished in fourth place in his attempt to become the first athlete to win six medals at a single Winter Olympic Games.
Although Fillon Maillet sprinted out to a commanding early lead, Johannes Thingnes Boe stuck with the Frenchman and eventually passed him to win the race at the 1.5-kilometer mark. It was close heading into the first prone shoot, but both frontrunners ended up missing their target and earning early penalty laps.
Ten competitors shot a perfect round, putting Sweden’s Sebastian Samuelsson in the lead ahead of Canada’s Christian and Scott Bow. However, the outcome was far from certain.
Scott Gow took the lead while Fillon Maillet and Johannes Thingnes Boe made up time less than a kilometre after leaving the shoot. After the athletes returned for the second prone shoot, Johannes Thingnes Boe was once again in the lead, this time ahead of Fillon Mallet, despite the fact that the wind’s direction was completely unpredictable.
Thingnes Boe made it through the targets without a hit, but Fillot Mallet missed, forcing him to make up significant ground once more. The Frenchman has been doing exceptionally well in the standing shoots, and the Norwegian now had to decide whether to put the hammer down or conserve his energy for those.
However, Fillon Mallet continued to lose time on the following lap, and by the time he reached the first standing shoot, he was approximately 36 seconds behind the leader. However, after completing it, he closed the gap to 15.9 seconds behind his Norwegian competitor, who was six seconds ahead of Sweden’s Martin Ponsiluoma.
There was now only one shot left in the race, and it was a make-or-break moment. Fillon Mallet was only 24.9 seconds behind Thingnes Boe, who had picked up the pace, with less than 1 kilometre to go. The Norwegian held a 27-second advantage and needed to make a clean shot in the last round to win.
Johannes Thingnes Boe took a deep breath, started strong with three wins, and then flub the final two. Fillon-Mallet, generally a solid shooter, missed his first three targets, costing him a chance at a gold medal. Thingnes Boe would not have to worry about being challenged for the gold because Ponsiluoma missed a shot as well.
By contrast, Fillon-Mallet had little chance of winning a medal after finishing 30 seconds behind Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen after the penalty laps. Over the next kilometre, he gained back 10 seconds, but it wasn’t enough.
Final Words
Johannes Thingnes Boe was coasting to the finish line, and he began his celebrations as soon as he entered the stadium, blowing a kiss to the camera on the home straight and slowing down to a crawl to soak in his victory.
World sprint champion from the previous year, Joonas Ponsiluoma, crossed the finish line in second to win Finland’s first Olympic medal, followed by Sweden’s Anders Christiansen, who glanced behind to make sure he wasn’t being chased by France’s failed Olympic medal hopeful, Vincent Fillon Mallet.
