Biathlete Oļegs Maļuhins Returns to Latvia After Six Years in Russia

Former Latvian biathlete Oļegs Maļuhins, who was the first Latvian to win a Biathlon World Cup stage, has returned to Latvia after six years in Russia. He revealed this in an interview with the website Sportajaunumi.com. Biathlon is a winter sport combining cross-country skiing and rifle shooting.

Maļuhins moved to Russia, which launched the war in Ukraine, for love. For two of those six years he coached the junior and youth national team in Saint Petersburg. After a breakup, he came back to Daugavpils this spring, where he has set up his own company and works as a taxi driver.

Coaching and restrictions

He said the last two years in Saint Petersburg were hard, as working with young people had become difficult. After his athletic career ended, Maļuhins stayed in biathlon: for a time he worked with Ilmārs Bricis in the Lithuanian national team, and from 2015 at a youth boarding school in Madona.

Latvian law restricts athletes and sports specialists who worked in Russia after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine: they cannot be included in Latvia's national team or receive state or municipal funding. Maļuhins said he accepts the ban and is not interested in politics. His biography does include a run for the Saeima, Latvia's parliament, in 2002.

Career and young talent

Maļuhins singled out 17-year-old Rihards Lozbers as a standout young biathlete, saying that if he keeps progressing he could surpass the famed Norwegian biathlete Ole Einar Bjørndalen.

Maļuhins himself won a 10-kilometre sprint at a World Cup stage in Canada in the 1998/1999 season. He competed at four Olympic Games; in 1998 in Nagano he finished sixth in the sprint and in the relay. At the 1999 World Championships he was fifth in the sprint and fourth in the pursuit, and he ranked in the World Cup overall top twenty for three consecutive seasons.