Yuri Kashkarov
Yuri Fyodorovich Kasch Karow (Russian Юрий Фёдорович Кашкаров; born December 4, 1963 in Khanty-Mansiysk ) is a former Soviet biathlete. With five gold, three silver and one bronze medal, he is one of the most successful athletes at Biathlon World Championships.
Yuri Kasch Karow has four older brothers. Even before he started school, he stood for the first time on skis. In fourth grade, he moved to a sports school. The first successful ski competition he competed in the seventh grade. A short time later he was taken by Vladimir Putrow to the Sverdlovsk sports school. At that time there were in Khanty-Mansiysk still no opportunities Biathlon exercise at a high level and the biathlon center of the Soviet Union was in Sverdlovsk. There he began the sport of biathlon and managed in the early 1980s in the Junior National Team in the USSR. At 17 years, the Junior World Championships 1981 in Lahti, which were held until 1988 as part of the Biathlon World Championships were his first international competition. He had made it very much, but remained well below its potential and had to make do with space 32 over 10 km. But his coach did not give him and the very next year, the then junior team coach Salinski appointed him to the national team for the World Junior Championships 1982 in Minsk. There he was clearly improved and was considered first over 15 km, 3 over 10 km and 2 in the relay triple medalist.
The Biathlon World Championships 1983 in Antholz were then his big break. Although still in the junior age he was allowed to start it already in the junior and the senior class. In the junior class, he won over 10 km and with the relay. In the senior class, he finished in single race over 20km with three penalties on the 7th Place. In relay races, he won the seniors together with Algimatas Schalna, Pyotr Miloradow and Sergei Bulygin the gold medal ahead of the teams of the German Democratic Republic and Norway. At the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo, he was 10th in the sprint and 35th in singles. With the Soviet relay he won gold again. In a much more exciting race than a year before he won with Dmitry Vasilyev, Schalna and Bulygin off Norway and the Federal Republic of Germany.
In 1985, he celebrated his greatest successes in the sport of biathlon. He won superior to the gold medal in singles at the Biathlon World Championships 1985 in Ruhpolding. He'd end up with zero penalties, almost one and a half minutes ahead of the runner-up Frank -Peter Roetsch. Also in the season he was able to win with Schalna, Bulygin and Andrei Senkov gold again. In the overall standings the Biathlon World Cup, he managed in 1984/85 with second place behind Frank -Peter Roetsch the best result of his career.
A year later at the World Championships 1986 in Oslo, he managed a 6th place over 20 km of not to defend his title, but in the season he won with Vasiliev, Valery Medwedzew and Bulygin its overall fourth World Championship gold medal. Also at the Biathlon World Championships 1987 in Lake Placid, he was with 6th place in the sprint and 5th place in the single well on the road, in the relay passed it with Vasilyev, Alexander Popov and Medwedzew but only to silver behind the season of the GDR.
The 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary ran a bit disappointing for him. Although they started with a fifth place in the individual still quite promising, but after a 18th place in the sprint he was not considered for the season and could only watch as his teammates won the gold medal. The Biathlon World Championships 1989 in Feistritz an der Drau were again successful with three medals. A bronze medal in the sprint followed gold in the first time at a World Cup discharged team competition. Together with Bulygin, Popov and Sergei Tschepikow won the Soviet Union with only one penalty ahead of Germany and the German Democratic Republic. On the final day of the World Cup, then reached for the Soviet squadron, which contested the same cast as in the team competition, even to silver behind the GDR.
At the World Championships 1990, which took place due to poor conditions and shifts at three different places, Kasch Karow was then for the first time at the World Championships without a medal. In the single in Soviet Minsk he was fourth, as well as the team competition in Oslo. In the relay race, which was canceled during the race on the first attempt in Oslo due to heavy fog and could be discharged later in the Finnish Kontiolahti, the Soviet Union occupied the fifth place. The Biathlon World Championships 1991 in Lahti, then, were the last major title fights for Yuri Kasch Karow. He was 12th in the sprint and won with Popov, Sergei Tarasov and Tschepikow Season silver under the flag of the United team in the individual and in the team, he did not play.
Yuri Kasch Karow is 1,86 m tall and had a competition weight of 80 kg. After his career he worked for some time at the Biathlon Center in Khanty-Mansiysk. Today he lives with his family in Moscow and works as a biathlon coach. In his spare time he plays tennis or football.