Fresh Air

Combining cross-country race skiing and rifle marksmanship, Biathlon originated in Scandinavia where primitive hunters traveled on skis to pursue game in the winter months. In the late 1700s, Swedish and Norwegian border patrol ski troops held the first Biathlon competition. It became an Olympic sport in 1960 in Squaw Valley and has grown into the most popular winter sport in Europe.

Millions of Europeans will tune in to Maine’s Saint John Valley March 3-6, as it hosts the first Biathlon World Cup ever held in New England. Fort Kent joins the upper echelon of only three other United States World Cup host cities, among them Olympic Games hosts Lake Placid, New York, and Salt Lake City, Utah. Event Manager and Chief of Competition, Max Cobb, says, “It’s a real tribute to the Maine Winter Sports Center and Fort Kent’s extraordinary volunteers that this event is coming.”

Portland’s philanthropic Libra Foundation founded the Maine Winter Sports Center in 1999 to reintroduce skiing to Aroostook County, thereby spurring economic growth. The effort has expanded with the installation of a second center in Presque Isle. The Center’s successful bid for the World Cup Biathlon 2004 is its most exciting accomplishment to date, fulfilling its original goal of attracting national and international competitions to the area.

Activities and entertainment surrounding the World Cup make the trek to this northern most point of the state more worthwhile. Throughout the week, visitors can join the town in celebrating amidst the Fort Kent Music Festival featuring daily Acadien cultural music, and on-going Biathlon demonstrations. Coinciding with the Biathlon, the world- famous Banff Film Festival promises a cozy movie buff retreat from the cold.

Fort Kent is the eighth of nine World Cup Event stops that have spanned seven different, primarily middle Europe countries since early December. Cobb says, “It’s likely the overall winner will clinch the World Cup in Fort Kent,” before the final event at the end of March in Oslo, Norway.

Some 20,000 spectators and 150 competitors from 26 different countries will permeate the Fort Kent population of 4,100. Among them, world-class biathletes Ole Einar Bjoerndalen of Norway will compete on the men’s side, winner of all four Biathlon Olympic gold medals in Salt Lake City 2000, and on the women’s, former World Champion and Olympian Martina Glagow from Germany.

Cobb says no Maine biathletes have a lock on competing. But those who got started in the Maine Winter Sports Center biathlon program, still only juniors, are likely to soon make their mark in years to come. Watch for them at the World Junior Championship that the Presque Isle Center will host in 2006.

For more information, go to www.fortkentbiathlon.org.

Photo credit: Getty Images, originally appeared on www.olympic.org