Norway’s Johannes Thingnes Boe won the men’s biathlon 15km mass start to claim their 15th gold medal at the Beijing Games on Friday, a Winter Olympics record achieved due to the country’s high level of professionalism across the board, according to Metro.

With two cross-country skiing races left, Norway already has victories in the biathlon, ski jumping, Nordic combined, speed skating, cross-country and freestyle skiing, so no-one could accuse them of being one-trick ponies.

Such is their depth of talent that Norway could afford to lose athletes of the calibre of Jarl Magnus Riiber (Nordic combined) and Simen Hegstad Krueger (cross-country skiing) to COVID-19 for much of the Games and still beat the record.

At the Beijing Games there are 109 gold medals in total, up from 102 in Pyeongchang four years ago and a far cry from the 16 on offer at the first Winter Olympics at Chamonix in 1924.

Marte Olsbu Roeiseland and Boe led the Norwegian medal charge in the 2022 biathlon events, with Therese Johaug and Johannes Klaebo doing the same a short distance away at the cross-country track, while at the ski jumping venue in between Marius Lindvik took gold on the large hill.

At Pyeongchang 2018, Germany and Norway had equalled the record of 14 gold medals won by a country at one Winter Olympics Games, matching the tally Canada had set at Vancouver 2010.

Source: Azerbaijan State News Agency