Émilien Claude (born 13 June 1999) is a French

biathlete The biathlon is a winter sport that combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. It is treated as a race, with contestants skiing through a cross-country trail whose distance is divided into shooting rounds. The shooting rounds are not ti ...

. Multiple Junior World Biathlon champion. Made his debut at the

World Cup A world cup is a global sporting competition in which the participant entities – usually international teams or individuals representing their countries – compete for the title of world champion. The event most associated with the name is ...

in 2021. He represented France at the 2016 Winter Youth Olympics in

Lillehammer Lillehammer () is a municipality in Innlandet county, Norway. It is located in the traditional district of Gudbrandsdal. The administrative centre of the municipality is the town of Lillehammer. Some of the more notable villages in the munici ...

and became the first ever French youth Olympic champion in biathlon.

Career

Émilien Claude has been competing in biathlon since 2010. He made his international debut in 2016 at the Youth World Championships in Cheile Grădiştei. Two weeks later, he competed at the Winter Youth Olympics in

and won the gold medal in the sprint. The following year at the 2017 World Youth Championships in Osrblie he achieved two more victories in the sprint and pursuit. Claude made his debut in the IBU Cup at the start of the 2018/19 season in Ridnaun, where he also achieved his first good result in sprint made an 18th place. At the end of the winter, he also took part in his first

European Championships A European Championship is the top level international sports competition between European athletes or sports teams representing their respective countries or professional sports clubs. In the plural, the European Championships also refers t ...

. In 2019/20, The 21-year-old Émilien made his World Cup debut in Oberhof and immediately scored World Cup points with 33rd place. Back in the juniors, he then made a breakthrough at the Junior World Championships, winning all races except individual race. He was therefore allowed to compete in the World Cup again at the end of the season, but did not finish in the points. He won his first race on the IBU Cup stage in January 2022 in the

Brezno Brezno (; 1927–1948: ; or ; ) is a town in central Slovakia with a population of around 21,000. Etymology The name is derived from the Slovak word "breza" for birch. Geography Brezno is located within the Geomorphological division of Slovak ...

sprint, ahead of Norway's Sindre Pettersen and Russia's Petr Pashchenko.

Personal life

Claude's mother Christine was also a biathlete and finished eighth in the individual race at

World Championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game ...

in 1984, his father Gilles died in January 2020 in the Canadian province of

Québec Quebec is Canada's largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, New Brunswick to the southeast and a coastal border ...

when he collapsed and drowned in

Lac Saint-Jean Lac Saint-Jean (, ) is a large, relatively shallow lake in south-central Quebec, Canada, in the Laurentian Highlands. It is situated north of the Saint Lawrence River, into which it drains via the Saguenay River. It covers an area of , and is ...

during a snowmobile excursion. His older brothers Florent and

Fabien Fabien is both a French given masculine name and a French surname. Notable people with the name include: People with the given name Fabien: *Fabien Audard (born 1978), French professional football (soccer) player *Fabien Barthez (born 1971), ret ...

are also top-level biathletes. Claude is in a relationship with the Austrian biathlete Anna Gandler.

Biathlon results

All results are sourced from the

International Biathlon Union The International Biathlon Union (IBU; ) is the international governing body of biathlon. Its headquarters were in Salzburg, Austria, until May 2020, when the Federation moved to Anif, on the outskirts of the city. It was rocked by a corruption ...

World Championships

''1 medal (1 silver)''

World Cup

Individual podiums

Relay podiums

Youth and Junior World Championships

''7 medals (5 gold, 2 bronze)''

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Claude, Émilien 1999 births Living people French male biathletes Sportspeople from Épinal Skiers from Vosges (department) 21st-century French sportsmen Biathletes at the 2016 Winter Youth Olympics Youth Olympic gold medalists for France Biathlon World Championships medalists