In the moment of triumph, all disputes were forgotten – at least that’s how it seemed from the outside. When Julia Simon crossed the finish line in the Nové Město biathlon arena, her teammates Eric Perrot, Quentin Fillon Maillet and Justine Braisaz-Bouchet hugged her, patted her on the shoulder, laughed and congratulated each other on their achievements. Few people had previously expected that the French mixed relay team won the first gold medal at the World Championships in the Czech Republic and not the Norwegian one. The fact that Julia Simon, as the final runner, ironed out a mishap of her predecessor Justine Braisaz-Bouchet, gave the whole thing an additional special touch.
The two biathletes are currently involved in a legal dispute. In the summer, the French newspaper “L’Équipe” reported that Justine Braisaz-Bouchet had reported her teammate. The accusation: Simon is said to have misused Braisaz-Bouchet’s credit card during a training camp in 2022 and purchased goods worth around 1,600 euros. Simon denied the allegations to the newspaper “Dauphiné Libéré”. She is a victim of the situation herself and has filed a complaint against an unknown person for identity theft. Her name was used without her knowledge.
Investigations are currently underway in the case, which became more explosive this winter. Justine Braisaz-Bouchet sat out the preseason. During this time, the Beijing 2022 Olympic mass start champion gave birth to her first child. Meanwhile, Julia Simon won the overall World Cup and became world champion in the pursuit. At the start of the current season in Sweden, the two athletes, who have known each other for years and come from the same place in Savoy, met again in the World Cup. Simon was unable to match her previous season’s performance – with four shooting errors she finished 31st in the first individual race. It seemed as if the 27-year-old, who had regularly cleared all the targets very quickly six months earlier, was standing next to herself. Braisaz-Bouchet also needed a bit of a start in her comeback season, but ran and shot among the world’s best again shortly before Christmas when she won all three individual races at the World Cup in Lenzerheide.
Julia Simon also fought back, won the first pursuit race of the year and traveled to the World Championships in top form. Both in Lenzerheide and in Oberhof, the two French women competed head-to-head in the pursuit and gave each other a quick, cool high-five in the finish area. In the Thuringian Forest they led the women’s relay team to victory. And now they also triumphed with the men in Nové Město on Wednesday.
“Don’t think about anything else for a moment”
Eric Perrot and Quentin Fillon Maillet had put their team on course for a medal before Justine Braisaz-Bouchet took over as the third runner – but couldn’t get along at all on the shooting range. After her three reloading cartridges were not enough to hit all five targets, the Frenchwoman had to do a penalty loop, but after a good standing stage and strong running performance, she managed to hand over to Julia Simon in third place. Despite the disappointment with her own race, Justine Braisaz-Bouchet thanked her teammates afterwards. Because Julia Simon continued the men’s performance, pulled out her rapid-fire skills twice at the shooting range, hit all ten targets without any hesitation and crossed the finish line first without any danger. Not only since this evening has she been the favorite – alongside her compatriot and the Norwegian Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold – in all individual races of the World Cup, which begin with the sprint on Friday (5.20 p.m. / ARD and Eurosport).
Julia Basic, Nove Mesto Published/Updated: Recommendations: 2 Julia Basic, Nove Mesto Published/Updated: Recommendations: 1
An individual medal is her goal for Nové Město, said Julia Simon, “because that’s what counts at a World Cup.” When FAZ asked how she managed to mentally process the bumpy start to the season, she said: “I said to myself, even after many conversations with the coaches, that this season would be difficult. The overall World Cup should therefore not be the goal, but to perform at the World Cup.” That’s purely a matter of your head, she explained, “for that you have to focus 100 percent and not think about anything else for a moment at the shooting range.”
Private matter between colleagues
After she managed to do this twice in the mixed relay, she bowed towards the audience, “because I wanted to say thank you that so many people came despite the bad weather and supported us so loudly.” At the award ceremony, the four French people sang their national anthem together. Shortly afterwards, while the other placed nations – Norway came second ahead of Sweden – each sat in a two-man, two-woman seating arrangement in the press conference, Eric Perrot formed a buffer between his teammates.
The association told the FAZ that neither is currently commenting on the legal dispute. It is a private matter, they want to wait for the investigation and concentrate on sport. The mood in the team is good. This was also confirmed by an uninvolved French athlete. While coach Cyril Burdet spoke of a test for the team in an ARD interview in November, he now said that the group had now “found back to a kind of serenity”. Julia Simon and Justine Braisaz-Bouchet have proven in recent months that two biathletes don’t have to be friends to perform at the top level.
