The Biathlon World Cup ended on Sunday in Oslo. It took to wait until the last stage of the calendar to know the winners of the general classification, Sturla Laegreid in the men's race and Franziska Preuss in the women's race. A thrilling season, therefore, which allowed the International Biathlon Union (IBU) to set records. Viewing hours have increased dramatically in Finland (+13%), in Norway (+13%), in Poland (+11%) or in Switzerland (+43%). "In France and Germany, 43,8 million and 133 million viewing hours were generated respectively, and the Scandinavian markets regularly achieved more than 50% market share", adds the IBU. The audiences were also there at the World Championships in Lenzerheide in February: up almost 20% in Switzerland compared to the 2024 edition. The event's market share reached 41% in Germany, 82% in Norway, 81% in Sweden and 71% in Finland.
The IBU also highlights that the videos published on its social networks have reached 240 million views, a 60% increase compared to the previous year. The authority's website also recorded an increase of more than 50% in the number of visitors (4,5 million), while the IBU app has been downloaded more than 220.000 times.The federation can hope to grow further next winter in view of the emergence of new nations: 14 different countries made it to the podium during the season, "a record in the recent history of biathlon".France, Norway, Sweden, Germany, and Italy took the biggest slices of the pie, but Latvia, the United States, Slovenia, Ukraine, the Czech Republic, Finland, Slovakia, Switzerland, and Bulgaria also managed to pull through.
