Everyone to Skis!: Skiing in Russia and the Rise of Soviet Biathlon

Contents

Contents Acknowledgments xi Introduction 3 ONE—Long Boards in the Long Nineteenth Century 13 Skiing: An Ancient Solution to Winter’s Problems Polar Exploration and the Great Game The Ski Clubs of Russia Ski Entrepreneurs: “A Wonderful Gift for Christmas!” The Sokol Movement in Russia Women’s Skiing Ski Racing and Nordiska Spelen A Ski Race to the South Pole TWO—The First World War to NEP 41 The Great War Revolution and Civil War in Russia Cavalry and Skiing The Soviet Hero—Toivo Antikainen Ski-Shooting and the Home Guard Women’s Skiing after the Revolution Team Events and Relay Races Skiing, Shooting and the Military Patrol Race Equipping the Masses with Skis Polar Exploration in the 1920s THREE—Stalin and the Inter-War Years 69 Multi-Day Ski Treks and the Stakhanovites Mechanized Cavalry and Stalin’s Arctic Gotov k trudu i oborone: Ready for Labor and Defense Sports Classification System Fascist States and International Sports viii Contents FOUR—The Winter War and the Great Patriotic War,1939–1945 88 The Winter War, 1939–1940 “Hurrah for Comrade Stalin!” S. K. Timoshenko and the Ski Mobilization Movement The Great Patriotic War, 1941–1945 FIVE—Post-War Soviet Sports and the Birth of Biathlon 114 The Myth of War The Soviet Union and International Cross-Country Ski Racing Soviet Skiers Take to the International Stage The Birth of Biathlon Biathlon in the USSR SIX—Skiing, Shooting and Politics, 1960 to 1962 153 Balancing Skiing with Shooting The Eighth Winter Olympics: Squaw Valley, California, 1960 Revamping Biathlon Ski Racing as a Spectator Sport Zakopane, Poland, and Umeå, Sweden, 1961 The World Ski Championships of 1962: “La guerre froide et le sport” Hämeenlinna, Finland: Fourth Biathlon World Championship, 1962 SEVEN—The Triumph of Soviet Biathlon, 1963 to 1966 188 Seefeld, Austria: Fifth Biathlon World Championship, 1963 The Ninth Winter Olympics: Innsbruck and Seefeld, Austria, 1964 “Repetition of a Legend” The Last of the Old Program Competitions: Elverum, Norway, 1965 “Sport Is the Cosmonauts’ Assistant” Biathlon’s New Epoch Garmisch-Partenkirchen, West Germany: Biathlon World Championships, 1966 EIGHT—The Era of Aleksandr Tikhonov 214 “Sasha Tikhonov from Novosibirsk” The Tenth Winter Olympics: Grenoble, France, 1968 The Olympic Biathlon Relay Tikhonov in the Limelight Contents ix NINE—Minsk: Thirteenth Biathlon World Championships, 1974 232 1974: The Year of Change Sport as Spectacle “Accept Flowers, Guests of Minsk!” TEN—The Fifteenth Winter Olympic Games: Calgary, Canada,1988 251 The East German Sports Program Steroids, Drugs and Blood Big Sport, Big Business The Winter Olympics: Calgary, 1988 “I’ve Created What They Say Is an International Incident” Calgary’s Aftermath Afterword 283 Notes 291 Bibliography 359 Index 381 ...