Ukrainian biathletes Dmytro Pidruchny and Vitaliy Mandzin, in an exclusive commentary for Suspilne Sport, criticized the quality of the pursuit skis at the 2026 Olympics.
In the men's pursuit race at the 2026 Olympics, Ukraine was represented by two biathletes — Dmytro Pidruchny and Vitaliy Mandzin. In the pursuit, both “blue-yellow” biathletes gained positions: Mandzin, starting in 24th place, advanced eight places, and Pidruchny gained seven places and finished 20th.
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Both Mandzin and Pidruchny failed to clear the firing lines: they earned two and three penalty rounds, respectively. In the absence of a clean shot, the Ukrainians had to make up for the gap by moving along the distance, where Vitaliy showed the 18th result, and Dmytro — the 34th.
Despite the progress in positions, in an exclusive comment for Suspilne Sport after the finish, both Ukrainian representatives stated that they had claimed higher places, but the quality of the skis got in the way. In particular, the captain of the Ukrainian national team said that he wanted “better” equipment preparation.
“Regarding the track race, not everything was as good as it should have been and would have been. There were some problems, the skis weren't super rockets, I would have liked it to be a little better.”
“The first lap was pretty good, because I was still fresh. It turned out that I was riding behind Philip Navrat – it played its role, I was able to hold on. The second or third lap I was practically riding alone, there was no one I could hold on to or impose a fight on. As I said, it wasn't smooth with the skis, the speed dropped a little. On the last lap, I didn't have enough strength, and the guys were stronger than me and were breaking away both on the plain and on the descents. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough to fight for higher positions.”
Mandzin added that the quality of the skis “wasn't critical,” but still affected the result in the pursuit race.
“In terms of a component like skiing, we could have added more. It seemed to me that somewhere in terms of speed we could have added more. That is, I think somewhere we could have worked a little better in terms of ski preparation. It wasn't critical and I won't say it was bad, because the track conditions were quite good – you could say, ideal. But we could have done better.”
Based on the results of the individual starts, both Ukrainians are claiming to be in the mass start of the Olympics. Pidruchny and Mandzin also have a men's relay race to look forward to at the Games — the senior coach of the national team, Nadiya Bilova, reported that Vitaliy and Dmytro are guaranteed to run the team race.