Defrasne at the death

ByEurosport

Published 18/02/2006 at 17:08 GMT

France's Vincent Defrasne beat Ole Einar Bjoerndalen in a nail-biting sprint finish to snatch Pursuit gold on Saturday. Defrasne fell on the final corner as he chased Bjoerndalen only to miraculously recover to pass the Norwegian and clinch a thrilling wi

It was a race that had everything, a true classic, and a finish that could barely have been scripted in Hollywood.

With a 30-second advantage coming in for the final shoot, Defrasne - trembling with the effort - threw two shots wide to open the door for Bjoerndalen, only for the Norwegian to miss a target himself to set up an improbably tight finale.

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Defrasne emerged from the penalty loop 6.5 seconds ahead of his rival, before Bjoerndalen cruised past with just over 800m of the 12.5km to go to deliver what many thought was the coup de grace to the Frenchman's gold hopes.

NIGHTMARE START

But Defrasne dug deep, clinging onto Bjoerndalen's coattails before somehow recovering from a fall with the finish line in sight to overhaul the defending Olympic champion a handful of metres from the line.

"When I found myself fighting with Bjorndalen I wanted to beat him and I knew I could do it," said Defrasne.

"I fell at one stage towards the end and that gave me that little extra energy. I was able to catch him straight away and I knew then that I would be able to overtake him."

Bjoerndalen's extra missed target - and the 30 seconds he started behind Defrasne at the start after only finishing 12th in the Pursuit - finally proved insurmountable even for the great man.

BIATHLON 2006 Torino 2006 France Pursuit Men Bjoerndalen Defrasne

Image credit: dpa

"I had decided to be aggressive and ski as fast as I could from the start but on the last hill I had nothing left in me," said the Norwegian.

Sprint winner Fischer came back from a nightmare start of four missed shots in the prone position to battle his way into third - 15 seconds off the pace - while Latvia's Ilmars Bricis took advantage of Norwegian range jitters to claim fourth.

Halvard Hanevold - starting second - missed three on his first standing shoot to blow his hopes of adding gold to Individual bronze and Sprint silver, while team-mate Frode Andresen - third out of the start gate - ruined a fine start by missing five targets to place sixth.

Wolfgang Perner was unable to reproduce the form that saw him take a surprise fourth place in the Sprint, the Austrian missing seven targets to finish well down the field, while France's former World Cup winner Raphael Poiree failed to finish.

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