Biathlon has a long way to go in New Zealand before it reaches the dizzying heights of popularity it has achieved in Europe. However, Wanaka reporter Lucy Ibbotson finds great strides are being made in developing the sport in New Zealand.
New Zealand's only dedicated cross-country ski area Snow Farm, on the Pisa Range near Wanaka, has the potential to one day host world-class biathlon events, a top representative of the International Biathlon Union (IBU) believes.
IBU expert Ubaldo Prucker, of Italy, has decades of experience in top-level biathlon - a combination of cross-country skiing and rifle marksmanship - and was in New Zealand this month to run the IBU/International Olympic Committee Oceania Development Camp at Snow Farm.
During his visit - his second to New Zealand - he said, with some investment into developing its current facilities, Snow Farm could have a bright future hosting some of the world's biggest biathlon events, such as the Oceania championships and the IBU Cup.
Even the Winter Youth Olympic Games were within the realms of possibility with the involvement of the area's other skifields.
The Snow Farm ski course was ''fantastic'', Prucker said.
However, expanding the skifield's shooting range and replacing the existing uneven snow base on which the shooting platforms and targets sit with a permanent concrete structure were goals New Zealand's biathlon fraternity should keep firmly in its sights, he said.
The ongoing campaign to raise the standard of both New Zealand's winter biathletes and biathlon facilities was a worthy one, Prucker said.
''I'm really appreciating what they are doing and the intention of the IBU is to support this kind of development.''
Biathlon New Zealand executive committee chairman John Burridge said the IBU viewed New Zealand as ''a special project'' and had already been hugely supportive of its efforts to develop the sport here. It had provided funding for New Zealand athletes to participate in overseas development camps and backed a new exchange programme between New Zealand and Sweden, which was launched this month.
''IBU want us to come under the guidance of a major biathlon nation to help us develop to the point that we can front for international competition,'' Mr Burridge said.
''They have always been concerned that we are currently totally dependent on Sarah Murphy ... and they want us to build a much broader church.''
Canada-based Murphy (25) is New Zealand's best biathlon performer, having competed at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver. She is training at Snow Farm at present, in a bid to qualify for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics.
Olivia Thomson (17), of Wanaka, who competed at the 2012 Winter Youth Olympic Games in Innsbruck, Austria, is the country's other strongest contender, but thanks to the Wanaka Biathlon Club, formed in 2010, there are now many more promising biathletes coming up through the ranks.
Despite its name, the Wanaka club, which has about 30 active members, is the face of biathlon nationally and the only avenue in New Zealand for people to officially participate in the sport.
Interest in biathlon, particularly on a local level, is growing, and will be further boosted when a large group of Mount Aspiring College pupils start weekly biathlon training sessions this term as part of their curriculum.
While cross-country skiing was viewed as ''a bit pathetic and nerdy by the snowboarding set'', biathlon was becoming quite the opposite, Mr Burridge said.
''It's considered to be cool ... It is a sport that jells for New Zealanders as it combines our shooting skills with an endurance sport. We just need to lift our skiing skills as well as technique for entering and leaving the range, which the elites do in nanoseconds.''
Wanaka Biathlon Club chairman Phill Thomson said New Zealand biathletes were still ''amateurs'' on the world stage.
''To put it into context, it's like taking an Austrian or German rugby team and playing them up against the All Blacks ... But we have a better chance of performing well than an Austrian rugby team, because it's an individual sport,'' Mr Thomson said.
The growing pool of budding biathletes living near Snow Farm held promise for the future of the sport in New Zealand, he said.
''That's where you'll get the best athletes from, where they're able to easily get there [to Snow Farm] and it just becomes second nature.''
Fostering relationships with foreign teams was key to biathlon's growth in New Zealand.
''There's no reason why we can't quietly and steadily improve our facilities and our base of athletes and interact with overseas and European teams and offer training facilities. The kids in New Zealand will make great friends and learn a lot by osmosis.''
Snow Farm was already attracting increasing numbers of northern hemisphere biathletes, including Olympic gold medallist Anastasia Kuzmina, of Slovakia, who arrives next week to train.
''They're a bit surprised when they come here and see what we've got,'' Mr Thomson said.
Mr Burridge said the recent development camp showed the growth which had already been achieved since Murphy's first Olympic effort in Vancouver, much of which was ''due to Phill Thomson's effort and expenditure''.
Young biathletes from New Zealand, Australia, Japan, Italy and Sweden took part in the camp, the greatest number of nations ever gathered at Snow Farm at one time for biathlon.
The New Zealand participants were also being considered for selection for an exchange to Sweden later this year, and for a team to attend the IBU Junior World Championships in Maine, the United States, in February - the first time a New Zealand biathlon team has entered the event.
An inaugural Australia-New Zealand interschool competition is being planned for September at Snow Farm, and Mr Thomson believed there was also potential for Snow Farm to eventually host a large international late-season race which would serve as the first event on the European circuit.
The club's long-term goals were to get New Zealanders on the start line at the 2019 world championships in Sweden, which would be like ''getting a gold medal'', and to send a boy and a girl to the Winter Youth Olympics in Norway, in 2016, Mr Thomson said.
''We'd like to quietly grow and then one day, we surprise everyone, and we turn on the radio and New Zealand's won a big event.''
