Double Olympic champion Quentin Fillon Maillet reflects on sad events prior to PyeongChang 2018 that proved a foundation for Beijing 2022 success
During the Biathlon World Championships, French biathlete Quentin Fillon Maillet will try to win his first individual title, more than a year after his Beijing 2022 bonanza. For Olympics.com, he reflects on the origins of his success following concerning moments in his private life before PyeongChang 2018.
Biathlon
From the very first biathlon race, the mixed relay, Quentin Fillon Maillet had the first taste of those Beijing 2022 Games: Happiness.
With just one missed target and an epic finish alongside team-mates Julia Simon, Émilien Jacquelin and Anaïs Chevalier to win silver, the French biathlete won the first of his five medals, including two golds. It was a reward, not only for many years of hard work but also his revenge on the past.
Four years before becoming the first French athlete to win five medals in a single edition of the Olympic Winter Games, Fillon Maillet was living one of the most difficult periods of his life. While preparing for PyeongChang 2018, he found out two people close to him were seriously ill.
“In September 2017, I learn that my father-in-law has cancer and two weeks later, my girlfriend has breast cancer.”
Just five months later he was competing in the Republic of Korea, coming away with a best place of 29th, in the men's 15km mass start, from the three races in which he took part.
“I wanted revenge at the Olympic Games. I wanted to live that dream, that Olympic dream. I had this deep will, to come to the Games and win this gold medal.”
Fillon Maillet achieved his dream and some weeks before starting the 2022/23 World Cup season, in which the World Championships take place from 8-19 February in Oberhof, Germany, he talked to Olympics.com about the construction of his Olympic triumph.
“Everything is questioned”
In 2017, Quentin Fillon Maillet is 25. He has already achieved seven World Cup podiums and is about to compete in his first Olympic Winter Games.
“I start my preparation in May, over nine months before the Games, and everything goes well. I keep improving and I put all the chances on my side for the Games and the World Cup."
But then came the news and everything changed.
“At that time, everything is questioned. [In my life], all is about biathlon and I realise that health of my closest ones is way more important than biathlon. It was a difficult period because I continued with the season. My girlfriend told me ‘I won’t prevent doing what makes you happy’.”
“I understood the true value of life”
Fillon Maillet manages to have a good start to the season, claiming two World Cup podiums, but he travels to the Republic of Korea for the Games with thoughts directed elsewhere.
“I arrived to the Games with my girlfriend and father-in-law having to face strong treatments. They were K.O. My girlfriend lost her hair, I had to cut it myself,” he remembers, with difficulty.
A period then followed, exacerbated by the death of his father-in law, that deeply affected the French champion, on both personal and sporting plans.
“It made us stronger at the end, as I understood the true value of life, which is the health of everyone. Sport is anecdotical.
"It was a fight - tough for me and my closest ones. Especially for my closest ones. Sport came after and I understood it was not the priority.
“The way my girlfriend fought was very inspiring for what would happen next.”
Beijing 2022 success: “A dedication to my girlfriend and father-in-law”
“[In PyeongChang], I didn’t live the Olympic dream, as many athletes would have lived it. It was rather a nightmare for me,” Fillon Maillet told us.
The experience "animated me for those four years", he says, a foundation from which he achieved two Olympic gold medals, in the individual and pursuit, and three silvers, in sprint events, the mixed and men’s relays, and men's individual.
“It’s a revenge and a dedication to my girlfriend and my father-in-law, who fought for that. It was part of my construction. I would have preferred not to live that, but it allowed me to build myself and realise a season like the previous one.”
The latter part alludes to the 2021/22 World Cup season in which the now 30-year-old claimed his first World Cup big globe win, following three third places in a row.
Despite the painful origins of Fillon Maillet's foundations, they remain strong, in his personal life and in his sport.