Gabriela Koukalová

Gabriela Koukalová
Association	Czech Republic
birthday	1st November 1989 (age 30)
place of birth	Jablonec nad Nisou,  Czechoslovakia
Career
job	Student
society	SKP Kornspitz Jablonec
Trainer	Gabriela Svobodová Karel Soukal
Admission to the national team	2007
Debut in the European Cup / IBU Cup	2009
Debut in the World Cup	2009
World Cup victories	23 (17 individual wins)
status	resigned
End of career	May 28, 2019
Medal table
Olympic medals 0 × 2 × 0 × World Cup medals 2 × 2 × 2 × EM medals 0 × 1 × 0 × JWM medals 1 × 0 × 0 ×
winter Olympics silver 2014 Sochi Mass start silver 2014 Sochi Mixed relay  Biathlon world championships bronze 2013 Nové Město Mixed relay gold 2015 Kontiolahti Mixed relay silver 2015 Kontiolahti singles gold 2017 Hochfilzen sprint bronze 2017 Hochfilzen persecution silver 2017 Hochfilzen singles  European biathlon championships silver 2011 Ridnaun sprint  Biathlon Junior World Championships gold 2009 Canmore Season
World Cup balance
Overall World Cup	1. ( 2015/16 )
Individual World Cup	1. ( 2013/14 )
Sprint World Cup	1. (2015/16, 2016/17 )
Pursuit World Cup	1. (2015/16)
Mass start world cup	1. (2015/16, 2016/17)
Podium placements 1. 2. 3. singles 2 2 1 sprint 7th 3 2 persecution 4th 4th 2 Mass start 4th 3 3 Season 6th 4th 5
last change: February 15, 2017

Gabriela Koukalová (born November 1, 1989 in Jablonec nad Nisou as Gabriela Soukalová ) is a former Czech biathlete . She is a two-time world champion, two-time medalist at the Olympic Games and she won the overall World Cup in the 2015/16 season.

Athletic career

First successes (until 2012)

Gabriela Koukalová started for Jiskra Josefův Důl and the SKP Kornspitz Jablonec . Since childhood she was trained by her parents Gabriela Svobodová (successful former cross-country skier and winner of an Olympic silver medal) and Karel Soukal. In 2008 she competed internationally for the first time. At the Junior World Championships in Ruhpolding , she finished 36th in the individual, 37th in the sprint and 22nd in the pursuit. The 2009 Junior World Championships went better in Canmore , where Koukalová was 8th in singles, 15th in sprint and pursuit and won the relay title with Veronika Vítková and Veronika Zvařičová . In Ufa , a 7th place in the individual was the best result at the Junior European Championship, and Koukalová was 19th in the sprint and 20th in the pursuit. A third time she competed in a Junior World Championship in Torsby , where she finished 13th in the individual, 14th in the sprint and 10th in the pursuit. With the relay, however, the previous year's winner only reached eighth place.

In Nové Město na Moravě she made her debut in the IBU Cup in 2009 and reached 47th place in the sprint. In 2010 in Obertilliach she achieved her best result to date, finishing sixth in a sprint. In the same year she competed in the biathlon world cup for the first time in Hochfilzen and reached the 99th place in the sprint race. In Ruhpolding she ran together with Veronika Vítková, Magda Rezlerová and Zdeňka Vejnarová in the relay race to sixth place. The highlight of his career so far was the participation in the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver , where Koukalová was 60th of the individual and in the relay race with Vítková, Rezlerová and Vejnarová reached a rather disappointing place as 16th. After the games she reached 52nd place in the sprint at Holmenkollen in Oslo , at the season finale in Khanty-Mansiysk at the mixed relay world championship with Barbora Tomešová , Michal Šlesingr and Jaroslav Soukup place 7th. At the world championships in 2011 in Khanty-Mansiysk, Koukalová reached with the ranks 47 in the individual, 25 in the sprint, 22 in the pursuit and 11 with the relay good results.

International breakthrough (2012 to 2015)

The 2012/13 season brought Koukalovás international breakthrough to the top of the world. At the beginning of the season the entire Czech team was in good shape and secured third place in the first race of the season, the mixed relay in Östersund , Sweden . After several placements among the top 20, Koukalová won her first World Cup race in the sprint in Pokljuka after a faultless shooting. In the following pursuit she also stayed clear, but had to admit defeat to the extremely strong Miriam Gössner , who, despite two seconds behind from the sprint and five shooting errors, relegated Koukalová to second place. On the following day, Koukalová achieved third place in the mass start with two shooting errors behind Tora Berger and Miriam Gössner. At the competitions in Oberhof , she was prevented from taking part by the flu. At the competitions in Ruhpolding, she achieved eleventh place in the sprint without a shooting error, while with a total of six shooting errors in the mass start she only crossed the finish line as the last runner. At her home World Cup in Nové Město na Moravě, she reached third place behind the seasons of Norway and France together with Veronika Vítková, Jaroslav Soukup and Ondřej Moravec . She also achieved consistently good results in the individual races and was always in the top 20. In the individual, she was 12th, 14th in the sprint, 20th in the pursuit, 18th in the mass start race and tenth in relay. At the season finale in Khanty-Mansiysk , she won all three World Cup races. First she won the sprint and later the pursuit and the mass start.

The winning streak continued Koukalová in the 2013/14 season. First she surprisingly won the season opener with the mixed relay with Veronika Vítková, Zdeněk Vítek and Ondřej Moravec, and a little later the first individual of the season. After that, as the leader in the overall World Cup, she wore the yellow jersey until the competitions in Oberhof. In Ruhpolding, she secured the overall World Cup in this discipline with her second victory in the second and last individual competition of the season. At the last World Cup races before the Olympic Games in Antholz, part of the breech of her rifle broke when she shot her first sprint . When she violated the safety rules at the shooting range during the second shooting because she did not have the replacement rifle brought to the shooting mat by an official after a problem was signaled by a show of hands, but replaced the rifles herself, she was disqualified and therefore could not take part in the pursuit race. At the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi , she won the silver medal behind Darja Domratschawa in the mass start - 30 years and two days after her mother (at that time still under her maiden name Svobodová ) won the silver medal with the Czechoslovak cross-country relay at the 1984 Winter Olympics . Together with Veronika Vítková, Jaroslav Soukup and Ondřej Moravec, she won the silver medal with the mixed relay two days later. She finally lost her good position in the overall World Cup after the Olympic Games after she was unable to take part in the competitions in Pokljuka, Slovenia due to illness. In the last races of this season she was no longer able to intervene in the fight for the overall World Cup, a third place in Kontiolahti , Finland, was her best place in the World Cup after the Olympic Games. In the end, she finished fourth in the overall ranking behind Kaisa Mäkäräinen , Tora Berger and Darja Domratschawa. At the 2015 World Championships in Kontiolahti, Finland, she won the gold medal in the mixed relay together with Veronika Vítková, Ondřej Moravec and Michal Šlesingr, and also silver in the individual competition.

Overall World Cup win (2015/16)

After Darja Domratschawa , the winner of the overall World Cup of the previous year, paused the entire 2015/16 season , Koukalová was one of the favorites in this ranking alongside second-placed Kaisa Mäkäräinen and Marie Dorin-Habert, who was so successful at the 2015 World Championships. After a victory by Dorothea Wierer in the opening race in Östersund , Sweden , she won the sprint race and thus took over the yellow jersey of the leaders in the overall World Cup. After Dorin-Habert's second place in the pursuit in Pokljuka, Slovenia, she had to hand this over to her French competitor for a race. With second place in the mass start race, she took the lead again in the overall World Cup standings and defended it until the end of the season. In the penultimate race of the winter, the pursuit race in Khanty-Mansiysk , Russia , she won the overall standings for the winter and the pursuit standings. Up until this race, eleventh place in the pursuit at the 2016 World Championships was her worst placement of the winter and therefore her only result outside of the top 10. Despite this constancy, which she showed both in running performance and at the shooting range, she was surprisingly unable to win a medal in either the individual races or in a relay competition at the World Championships in Oslo, Norway . With two fourth and one fifth places, she narrowly missed the medal ranks in three of four individual races. At the last World Cup of the winter in Khanty-Mansiysk, Russia, she not only won the sprint but also the Pursuit World Cup and won the overall World Cup in the penultimate race of the season. After the mass start race had to be canceled due to strong gusts of wind, she also became the overall winner of the mass start classification.

The following important information is missing from this article or section:

The 2016/17 season is completely missing

Help Wikipedia by researching and pasting it .

Health problems and end of career (2017 to 2019)

In preparation for the 2017/18 season , Koukalová developed muscular problems, especially in the calf muscles. Longer, harder loads were not possible for her, and there were no starts in the World Cup. A planned start in the second-rate IBU Cup in January 2018 had to be canceled for health reasons. Also in January, Koukalová announced that it would not participate in the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. At this point, she still left a decision about the future of her sporting career open.

In the 2018/19 season , Koukalová also did not start, not only because of the problems with the Achilles tendon and the calf muscles, but also, as she herself said, because she suffered from eating disorders for years, for which she was among others. a. blames the high pressure to perform.

She ended her active career on May 28, 2019.

Private

On May 16, 2016, she married the Czech badminton player Petr Koukal and took his last name.

statistics

World Cup victories

Single race

Relay race

No. place date discipline 01  Pokljuka December 14, 2012 sprint 02  Khanty-Mansiysk March 14, 2013 sprint 03  Khanty-Mansiysk March 16, 2013 persecution 04th  Khanty-Mansiysk 17th March 2013 Mass start 05  Ostersund November 28, 2013 singles 06th  Ruhpolding January 10, 2014 singles 07th  Ruhpolding January 12, 2014 persecution 08th  Pokljuka December 18, 2014 sprint 09  Ostersund 5th December 2015 sprint 010  Ruhpolding January 16, 2016 Mass start 011  Presque Isle February 11, 2016 sprint 012  Presque Isle February 12, 2016 persecution 013  Ostersund 4th December 2016 persecution 014th  Nové Město December 18, 2016 Mass start 015th  Oberhof January 6, 2017 sprint 016  Oberhof January 8, 2017 Mass start 017th  Hochfilzen ( WM ) February 10, 2017 sprint

No. place date discipline 01  Ostersund November 24, 2013 Mixed season 1 02  Oberhof January 7, 2015 Season 2 03  Ruhpolding January 14, 2015 Season 2 04th  Oslo February 15, 2015 Season 2 05  Kontiolahti ( WM ) 5th March 2015 Mixed season 3 06th  Presque Isle February 13, 2016 Season 4 1With Veronika Vítková , Zdeněk Vítek and Ondřej Moravec . 2With Eva Puskarčíková , Jitka Landová and Veronika Vítková . 3With Veronika Vítková , Michal Šlesingr and Ondřej Moravec . 4thWith Eva Puskarčíková , Lucie Charvátová and Veronika Vítková .

Biathlon World Cup placements

The table shows all placements (depending on the year, including the Olympic Games and World Championships).

• 1st - 3rd Place: Number of podium placements
• Top 10: Number of placements in the top ten (including podium)
• Points ranks: Number of placements within the point ranks (including podium and top 10)
• Starts: Number of races run in the respective discipline
• Relay: including mixed relays

placement	singles	sprint	persecution	Mass start	Season	total
1st place	2	7th	4th	4th	6th	23
2nd place	2	3	4th	3	4th	16
3rd place	1	2	2	3	5	13
Top 10	10	24	20th	16	26th	96
Scoring	12	36	35	21st	37	141
Starts	17th	49	38	21st	37	162
Status: February 12, 2017

winter Olympics

Results at Olympic Winter Games:

winter Olympics		singles	sprint	persecution	Mass start	Season	Mixed relay
year	place
2010	Vancouver	59.	-	-	-	15th
2014	Sochi	4th	29	4th	2.	4th	2.

World championships

Results at Biathlon World Championships:

World Championship		singles	sprint	persecution	Mass start	Season	Mixed relay
year	place
2010	Khanty-Mansiysk (Mixed Relay World Championship)						7th
2011	Khanty-Mansiysk	46.	24.	21st	-	11.	11.
2013	Nové Město	12.	14th	20th	18th	10.	3.
2015	Kontiolahti	2.	18th	5.	5.	7th	1.
2016	Oslo	5.	4th	11.	4th	6th	6th
2017	Hochfilzen	2.	1.	3.	4th	4th	7th

Awards

• 2017: Sportsman of the Year (Czech Republic)

Web links

Commons : Gabriela Koukalová  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Website Gabriela Koukalova
• Gabriela Koukalová in the IBU database (English)
• Gabriela Koukalová in the Sports-Reference database (English; archived from the original )

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Gabriela Koukalova private: career end because of bulimia? Biathlon star does not return , on: news.de, accessed December 6, 2018
2. ↑ Ex-world champion Koukalova ends her career. sport.orf.at, May 28, 2019, accessed on May 28, 2019 . 
3. ↑ Gabriela Soukalová got married - and is now called Koukalová , Prag aktuell, May 13, 2016
4. ↑ Lothar Martin: Gabriela Koukalová: Successful as a biathlete, matured as a person. In: Radio Prague. December 22, 2017. Retrieved December 23, 2017 .