How athletes cope with Olympics pressure

Today, there were two mass start biathlon races at once at the Olympic Games in Beijing. Our athletes took part in both of them. Unfortunately, the Belarusians didn't make it to the podium for the third time. Our leaders were not able to pass the shooting range clear. And that was the last event of the Olympic programme for the shooting skiers, who gave us the most positive emotions and added a silver medal to the national team's collection. And in general the psychological nerve of these Olympics becomes more and more acute closer to the end of the competitions.

The clearest example and most discussed scandal is in women's figure skating. The favorite, very young Kamila Valieva, was simply psychologically killed by the court disputes over her doping sample. The entire world watched her final skating performance with bated breath. And what was going on in the athlete's soul? The result was a live tragedy. The fourth place and the eloquent silence of the sport functionaries. Before the start, they announced that if Kamila won a medal, there would be no awards ceremony.

Russian figure skaters still have the silver and bronze. Anna Shcherbakova gave a perfect skating performance and became an Olympic champion. Silver went to Sasha Trusova with the most difficult program in the history of the Games, she was the first to perform five quadruple jumps, but not perfectly, and gave the most emotional speech of the Olympics.

And there are a lot of such examples. We remember the tears of our girls after the individual race. The Olympics are a sporting and emotional peak for everyone who enters the starting line here. The specialists pay more and more attention to this aspect. There are psychologists in every team. Every year the pressure on athletes behind the scenes only increases.

Our fans had a reason to be nervous today. The mass start race in the women's biathlon gave hope for success of two Belarusians: Hanna Sola and Dzinara Alimbekava.

Hanna Sola made 8 misses, but thanks to her trademark speed she managed to get into the top ten. In total, she went to the firing line 18 times at this Olympics and only twice was she able to cover all the targets at once. She also failed to cope with the Olympic pressure. Dzinara Alimbekova shot a little better, but finished 12th in the final protocol.

The main favorites confirmed their status at the end of the race. France got the gold and Norway got silver and bronze.

Half an hour later the men competed in the same discipline. Anton Smolski, the only Belarusian in the mass start, started the race actively. Up to the first shooting range he was in the leading group. Only two misses on his shooting range and a clean performance on the third approach allowed him a chance, but two inaccurate shots on the last range pushed our athlete sharply back to the final 17th place. And for the second time in one biathlon day, two Norwegian athletes got on the podium. This time they got gold and bronze. Silver went to a biathlete from Sweden.

Speed skater Ignat Golovatyuk takes 6th place

Our skater showed a very good time. Ignat Golovatyuk covered a distance of 1000 meters in 1 minute and 8.63 seconds. The Olympic gold went to the Netherlands, the second and third places went to athletes from Canada and Norway.

Tomorrow the Belarusian athletes will finish their performance at the Games in Beijing. Marina Zuyeva, Evgeniya Vorobieva and Ignat Golovatyuk will perform at the Ice Ribbon Arena in the mass start in speed skating.