Every team created a four-year plan in 2022, building towards the 2026 Milan/Cortina Olympic Winter Games. The USA focused on two points: rebuilding their women’s team while integrating veterans with youth on the men’s squad, and most importantly training with consistency to achieve goals.

Rebuilding Women’s Team

Head Coach Armin Auchentaller who has guided the team for much of the past 15 seasons, explained, “Many of our athletes, especially on the female side, the people who did the best results left the team after Beijing. We had to start over with the female project which is not easy.”

Heading into the Olympic season, Auchentaller is optimistic about the women’s development in the past three years. “At the moment, we have a good team, a strong improving team. I feel good about the direction the girls are heading.”

Try to Improve Every Day

Continuing, “As for the men’s team. We started with a lot of young ones who have developed quite well. They meshed well with the more experienced guys. We have a very good training environment. It is very impressive how they push each other and try to improve every single day.”

Although this group had some good individual and relay results, this has not altered the OWG plan. “What we tried to do is develop every year, even though some athletes had and hopefully will have great success. We pursue those goals by focusing on the process, trying to be a better team and athlete the day after. We go with little steps.”

Campbell Wright: “Knows every single day and session counts”

Campbell Wright’s two Silver medals in Lenzerheide (the fourth and fifth-ever for the USA) did not alter his OWG approach. “He is very hungry; stays hungry. Campbell is very committed to train hard every day which shows nothing has changed. He is still the guy who likes to have fun and has one thing that drives him: to be good. He knows every single day counts, every single session counts.”

Altitude training remains a part of the original program, much like their rivals, in preparing for Antholz’s thin air. “The focus on altitude is not something new. Everybody is doing it; science speaks pretty clearly that you should do it, especially since the competitions will be at altitude. You just have to expose yourself to it and work with it.”

“Communication and nailing the workouts”

Auchentaller admitted this season’s training remains as planned with a few final alterations. “It will look pretty much like last year, maybe just tweaking a few things for some athletes. The plan is only as good as the communication between the athlete and coach. Communication and nailing the workouts precisely, along with staying healthy are the keys to success.”

“Nailing the workouts” enables long-term consistency. “The daily work is the key to reaching good results. I want medal-producing training sessions rather than focusing on the medal itself and forgetting about training. We win if we have day-after-day good training sessions which we think have been high quality."

Striving for the USA’s first-ever Olympic biathlon medal, Auchentaller admitted, “If we accumulate a lot of those high-quality sessions, we can go into the Olympic season with a good feeling. We will only find out when the season starts and will see where we are.”

Photos: IBU/Vianney Thibaut, Christian Manzoni, Nordic Focus