US Biathlon reluctant to join US Ski & Snowboard
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The U.S. Biathlon board of directors voted Wednesday to push back a planned merger with U.S. Ski & Snowboard in order to review the details after facing opposition from its community.
As part of the motion, the board said it supports the principles of a rare consolidation between two Olympic sport organizations. But the board also wanted a “definitive agreement that more specifically defines them and ensures governance autonomy for U.S. biathlon.” A working group is being set up and will present a draft by late August.
The board’s decision followed a long closed-door meeting to decide whether to remove the board’s chair, Bob Hall, over an ethics claim. It was dismissed.
The integration became necessary, officials said, to boost biathlon’s revenues and performance. It also drew concern among athletes who felt it might hurt the sport. Hall said the alliance means a $3 million improvement to its budget over the next four years.
Athlete representative Jake Brown said the board recognizes there could be good opportunities with the merger, but added, “we also need to do it right and do it with the membership, the community, athlete support.”
U.S. Biathlon Association’s board of directors began working on the proposal in March after the U.S. again failed to win a biathlon medal at the Winter Olympics, and told members in May.
USSS is a powerhouse in winter sports, overseeing 11 sports and 250 elite athletes, including Alpine ski champion Mikaela Shiffrin and snowboarding superstar Chloe Kim. They have a budget of $70 million and 40,000 members, compared with biathlon’s $4 million budget and 1,407 members. Biathlon, which combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting, has never won an Olympic medal. It’s wildly popular in Europe.
Cross-country ski Olympian Kikkan Randall, who’s on the USSS board, said the collaboration would benefit both groups.
“There’s a recognition of how big biathlon is in Europe. Being able to tap into that popularity and marketability is really intriguing,” Randall said.
But some biathletes feared USSS would cut the sport’s funding, as it did for U.S. Ski Jumping in 2010 and Nordic Combined in 2014. Longtime biathletes Jon Schafer of Colorado and Marc Sheppard of Montana conducted interviews with people in biathlon and cross-country ski communities and produced an analysis of the merger that concluded working with USSS should be a “last resort.”