Tommaso Giacomel dominated the fourth stop on the 2025/26 Biathlon World Cup calendar: the Italian took two consecutive wins in Oberhof, and is now the overall cup leader following Johan-Olav Botn’s absence. All Things Snow recaps everything that happened in Germany on the men’s side.

By Daniele Spadi

When news broke out that points leader Johan-Olav Botn would miss out on all competitions in Oberhof due to illness, it was clear that his yellow bib was in danger. His two main rivals – France’s Éric Perrot and Italy’s Tommaso Giacomel – had in fact a great chance to gain valuable points over the young Norwegian in his absence.

What many didn’t predict, however, was the complete sweep that took place on the German mountains. Giacomel came to Oberhof on a high after having won the previous race of the season in Annecy, where he showed off both his skiing speed and shooting prowess to take home the first mass start of the 2025/26 campaign.

On Thursday, the sprint took place in difficult conditions – as it often happens in Oberhof – that saw very few athletes come away with a perfect shooting day. The Italian faltered in the prone shoot, though a flawless rest of the race saw him conquer his third win of the season in style.

Perhaps the best moment of his race, however, came at the very end. Knowing his great performance, he raised one hand to the sky as he crossed the finish line – a tribute to his dear friend and fellow biathlete Sivert Guttorm Bakken, who tragically lost his life less than three weeks ago over the Christmas break. Giacomel shared a heart-wrenching hug seconds after with Johannes Dale-Skjevdal, who scored his third podium of the season as he finished in third.

Between them was local hero Philipp Nawrath. The Germans had a terrific skiing performance on Thursday, with the 32-year-old taking the best result of the season despite one miss in the second shooting session, crossing the line just 13.2 seconds behind Giacomel

Good performances from Sebastian Samuelsson and Martin Uldal saw them finish in the top five, a little over 30 seconds behind the leader. Behind them, Perrot had to settle for sixth, his race ruined by two misses in the standing shoot. The first man who cleared all ten targets was Jesper Nelin, who took eighth tied with Lukas Hofer, the Italian showing off his great form despite his 36 years of age.

On Saturday, the pursuit saw Giacomel claim his third consecutive victory – but his race was far from straightforward. The windy weather conditions, paired with Oberhof’s usual reputation as the toughest skiing course of the season, made for an eventful race with plenty of misses.

Giacomel faltered six times in the first three shooting sessions, putting him over a minute behind Uldal, who was leading the race with just one miss before the last shoot. However, a fortunate turn of events – paired with one of Giacomel’s finest shooting performances on the final time of asking – vaulted him to the top once more.

The Italian brought it home on the last loop, fending off Uldal’s attacks and Samuelsson’s witty comeback. It was a historic win for the Italian: not only did he become the first Italian biathlete to win three races in a row, but he is now the first Italian to wear the yellow bib on the men’s side in 34 years, after Andreas Zingerle last wore it in 1992.

As Uldal and Samuelsson rounded out the podium, Dale-Skjevdal won the battle for fourth with Östersund native Martin Ponsiluoma. The star of the pursuit was undoubtedly Dmytro Pidruchnyi: starting from 41st, the Ukrainian gained an impressive 34 spots to finish in seventh, posting the fastest pursuit time thanks to just a single miss across all four shooting sessions.

Perrot failed to fully capitalize on Botn’s absence, as he missed five targets and crossed the line in eighth. Still, the Frenchman has shown impressive consistency so far, as he is yet to finish outside the top 10 this season.

Italy was also on the front foot on Sunday, with the men’s relay providing a thoroughly entertaining race that saw the top five nations separated by just 5.4 seconds.

The first leg saw Norway and France bolt away from the rest of the field, with Isak Frey and Fabien Claude hitting all 10 targets without having to rely on spare rounds. However, both nations hit the penalty loop twice in leg two – Émilien Jacquelin faltering in the prone shoot, while Dale did the same in the standing session.

This led Switzerland to take a surprising lead by the halfway stage with the Czech Republic in second and Germany in third, while Sweden was in fifth and just eight seconds off. Leg three favored Norway’s comeback, as Uldal failed to miss a single target and took the lead, with Sweden and Germany hot on his tail. France and Italy completed the top five, 18 and 30 seconds behind respectively.

The last leg was a showdown between these five nations. After a rather uneventful prone shooting session, a couple of misses for the top three enabled Perrot and Giacomel to close the gap.

Perrot ultimately left the shooting range first, though Dale was just four seconds behind him. The Norwegian’s exceptional skiing speed was no match for Perrot, thus enabling Norway to take their third consecutive relay win this season.

In fact, the entire podium was the same as in both Östersund and Hochfilzen, with France in second and Sweden in third. Italy missed out on a surprise top three by just one second, with Giacomel the fastest leg time and once again showing his incredible form. The home heroes had to settle for fifth, despite David Zobel’s best efforts to gift Germany a podium finish.

A triumphant weekend for Giacomel enabled the Italian to take over from Botn as the overall leader with a 51-point gap over the Norwegian. To add to his impressive start of the season, the Italian now leads all but one individual standing, as the red bib in the individual classifications still belongs to Botn.

Third is Perrot, who lost precious ground to Giacomel in Oberhof, and now sees Samuelsson hot on his tail. The Swede is yet to win a race this season, but his incredible consistency – paired with three podium finishes – sees him 24 points behind the Frenchman and 106 points behind Giacomel.

The 2025/26 Biathlon World Cup will now stay in Germany for one more week, as the Bavarian hills of Ruhpolding host the fifth event of the season, with a sprint and a pursuit scheduled to take place next week.

Header image credit: Christian Heilwagen / IBU