Quentin Fillon Maillet
France
Biathlon
Overall Ranks
#3 among French Olympians
#2 among Biathletes
#1 among French Winter Olympians
Olympic Results
2022
Sprint - Silver
Mixed Relay - Silver
Pursuit - Gold
Individual - Gold
Relay - Silver
2026
Sprint - Gold
Mixed Relay - Gold
Mass Start - Bronze
Relay - Gold
Total
Events - 15
Gold - 5
Silver - 3
Bronze - 1
Quentin Denis Fillon Maillet was born on August 16, 1992 in Champagnole, France, and grew up in the French Alps near the Swiss border. He took up cross country skiing when he was 10, then transitioned into biathlon at age 14. From 2015 to 2017, he won medals in every world championship, but only in the relay events.
He was still able to make the French Olympic team for the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, but didn't do anything of note. He finished 48th in the sprint, 44th in the pursuit, and 29th out of 30 in the mass start. It was an ignominious start to what would become a great career.
In 2019, he won his first individual World Championship medal, a bronze in the sprint. He won several more over the next few years, but was by no means a star headed into the 2022 Olympics. He entered all 6 biathlon events in Beijing, and by the time he finished, he had become a star.
He started out in the mixed relay, which was raced by 4 skiers, each of whom covered 6 km. The women went first, and at the halfway point, they held a slight lead. After the third leg, they had fallen to third place, 17 seconds behind the leaders, but Fillon Maillet skied an incredible leg, getting through without missing a shot and skiing the second-fastest time of the day. In the end, he fell just short, losing by less than a second to the Norwegian team, but it earned him his first Olympic medal, a silver.
Next up was the individual 20km race, where each miss carried a one minute penalty applied at the end. Fillon Maillet was the best skier of the event, finishing 31 seconds ahead of Johannes Thingnes Bo, who had beaten him at the end of the mixed relay, and since each missed 2 shots, he remained ahead of Bo. Anton Smolski of Belarus finished without a missed shot, but since he was more than 2 minutes behind Quentin, he ended up taking the silver, with Fillon Maillet earning his first gold.
The third event was the 10km sprint, where each missed shot added a 150m penalty loop to the course. Fillon Maillet had one miss on the first round of shooting, which allowed Bo to build a big lead. Fillon Maillet was the fastest skier the rest of the way, and Bo missed a shot in the second shooting portion, but his lead was too big, and Fillon Maillet came in 25 seconds behind to take the silver, 13 seconds ahead of Bo's older brother, Tarjei, who took bronze.
The next event was the 12.5 km pursuit, where each skier started out based on the results of the sprint event the day before, so Bo started out with a big head start, but he struggled in the shooting portion, missing 7 times, which added 1050 meters to his race. Fillon Maillet was perfect on his shooting, and ended up beating Tarjei Bo by 28.5 seconds for another gold medal.
Up next was the relay, where Fillon Maillet again took the anchor leg. The Russian athletes took a big lead early and built it up throughout the race, with a lead of over 40 seconds when the final leg started. France was in second the entire way up to that point and looked to be fighting for silver when the final Russian skier missed two shots at the final stop, allowing Germany, France, and Norway to catch up. Despite being the only country that didn't miss a shot, the French ended up getting another silver after the final Norwegian skier turned on the jets to win the race by 27 seconds.
In the final event, the mass start, it appeared that Fillon Maillet was going to win his 6th medal of the games, but on the final shooting portion, the wind kicked up, causing him to miss 3 shots, which added 450 meters to his race, and he ended up 13 seconds out of third place, just one place away from the medal. Even without it, he was the first biathlete ever to win 5 medals in a single Olympics, 3 days before Bo matched him.
He returned to compete again in the 2026 Olympics, again qualifying for all 6 events. In the mixed relay, which went first, the race started with the men's legs first, and Fillon Maillet handed off to the first female skier in third place, but after she posted the best time by a woman in the entire race, the French had a 19 second lead, which they extended to 26 seconds by the end to earn the gold medal.
He was the defending champion in the individual 20km, and was the favorite to repeat, but despite having the fastest time, he missed 4 shots, which added 4 penalty minutes, causing him to drop to 8th place at the end. He made up for it in the sprint, where he was one of the favorites since both Bo brothers had retired, leaving him as the only returning medalist. He was one of 5 skiers to shoot perfectly, then passed teammate Emilien Jacquelin on the home stretch to take home a gold medal.
That gave him a 16 second lead to start the next event, the pursuit, but he struggled with his shooting again, with 5 total missed, which caused him to fall to 7th place at the end. In the relay, Norway was expected to win, and started with a 50 second lead after the first leg, with France clear back in 13th place. 3 misses by the next Norwegian skier brought them back to the pack, and a perfect leg by Jacquelin gave France a slight lead at the halfway point. Fillon Maillet held that slight lead through his leg, and the final French skier was able to pull away to give them an upset victory by 10 seconds.
In the final event, the mass start, Fillon Maillet struggled again with his shooting, missing once in the first section, which put him way behind. He moved up to 9th by the second shooting section, where he didn't miss, and was in 5th by the next time he shot. He missed twice, which slowed his progress, but he still pushed through to get to 4th at the final shooting spot, then passed Philipp Horn of Germany on the home stretch to steal the bronze medal, despite having 4 missed shots, 3 more than any of the other top 4.
He has recently announced that he will continue to compete and plans to ski again in the 2030 Olympics. Even though his first Olympics did not go well, he earned 9 medals in the past 2 Olympic games, 5 of which were golds, and has already established himself as one of the greatest Olympians of all time, with more possibly to come.
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