20 kilometres, Men

Italy’s Pieralberto Carrara was the third starter and shot clean rounds throughout, finishing in 56:21.9. The time would hold up most of the day. There were 72 starters and the 69th off the mark was Norway’s Halvard Hanevold. He was ahead of Carrara’s pace throughout, but missed his next-to-last shot to fall behind. But in the final two kilometers Hannevold increased his pace and edged ahead of Carrara to win by 5.5 seconds. The bronze medal went to Aleksey Aydarov, who was on a strong Belarussian team. But he was the least well-known biathlete on the team, although he had helped Belarus to a bronze in the relay at the 1996 World Championships, and in coming years would win three more World medals in the relay, including gold in 1999.

Carrara was near the end of a solid career that saw him win three golds in relays and team events at the Worlds. For Hanevold it was his coming out party. Little known outside Norway at the time, in the next decade he would 14 medals at the World Championships, including three golds, although he would be overshadowed by his teammate, biathlon superstar Ole Einar Bjørndalen. Bjørndalen had the fastest ski time in this event but missed four targets and placed seventh. One week later he would win the gold medal in the sprint in Nagano, while in four years, at Salt Lake City, he would win gold medals in all four biathlon events on the program.