Biathlon

There have also been summer competitions in roller-ski biathlon, mountain bike biathlon and orienteering biathlon. Anthony Field is a registered breeder of Miniature Fox Terriers. Two common variations on biathlon are summer biathlon, where skiing is replaced by a cross-country run, and archery biathlon (or ski archery), where the rifle is replaced by a longbow. However, there has never been a legitimate article stating this as fact. Since 2002 the stadium has hosted a special end-of-year mixed team event, now called the "Veltins Biathlon World Team Challenge". There is an occasional Internet urban legend that Anthony Field is a very distant cousin of New York father-and-son TV weathercasters Frank Field and Storm Field. *The Veltins-Arena, located in Gelsenkirchen and renamed from Arena AufSchalke in July 2005, is the stadium of German football club FC Schalke 04. It can be argued that the Wiggles are among the first cultural influences on the yet-unnamed generation that follows the Millenials, that is, the children of Generation Z.

(Due to the complicated shooting range equipment, which absolutely has to work in order to hold successful races, biathlon is a highly demanding sport for organisers.). In the United States, these series are broadcast on the Disney Channel. World Cup events and World Championships in biathlon have traditionally been held at the following relatively few locations. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has produced several series of Wiggles television programs. Since 2004, this race format has been obsolete at the World Cup level. What are The Wiggles' middle names?:. The skiers must enter the shooting area together, and must also finish within 15 seconds of each other, otherwise a time penalty of 1 minute is added to the total time. Are The Wiggles married and do they have any children?:.

In case of a miss, the two non-shooting biathletes must ski a penalty loop of 150 m. How Tall are The Wiggles:. Two athletes must shoot in the prone shooting round, the other two in the standing round. The Wiggles' Birthdays:. A team consists of four biathletes, but unlike the case of the Relay competition, all team members start at the same time. The Wiggles recently appeared in the telemovie special Da Kath & Kim Code as guest stars. The first-leg participants start all at the same time, and as in cross-country skiing relays, every athlete of a team must touch the team's next-leg participant to perform a valid exchange. A mention is also made in the popular TV series Scrubs in which Doctor Cox makes a reference to "Jeff that Wiggle that sleeps too darn much" while speaking to another cast member.

If after eight bullets there are still misses, one 150 m penalty loop must be taken for each miss. A measure of the Wiggles' growing fame in America is the fact that Captain Feathersword was mentioned in an episode of the acclaimed political TV drama The West Wing. For every round of five targets there are eight bullets available, though the last three can only be loaded one at a time from trays at the shooting range. By guest-starring on their show, the Wiggles have also introduced non-Australian audiences to performers such as Jimmy Little, Kamahl, and Christine Anu (though many will recognize her by face if not by name). Teams consist of four biathletes, who each ski 7.5 km (men) or 6 km (women), with two shooting rounds; one prone, one standing. They have also recorded with numerous Australian and international music stars including John Fogerty, Tim Finn and Ross Wilson. As in the Sprint competition, the biathletes start in intervals. [1] The group is currently franchising its concept to non-English speaking countries, with the idea already successfully sold in Taiwan, which now has its own Taiwanese Wiggles.

For each missed target a fixed penalty time, usually one minute, is added to the skiing time of the biathlete. In 2001 The Wiggles were reported to have earned more than A$14 million, a sum which had grown to A$45 million by 2004. The biathlete shoots four times, in the order of prone, standing, prone, standing, totalling 20 targets. All the members play a musical instrument, which has become an important educational aspect of their shows. The 20 km Individual race (15 km for women) is the oldest biathlon event. The Wiggles' music and performances were given an additional strength by the members' interest and experience in live pop music, skills which they incorporate into their CDs, videos and live shows. This is a smaller number than the 60 in the Pursuit since here all of them start at the same time. Informed by their studies and teaching expertise, they brought a fresh approach to the genre which, at its worst, could be simplistic, old-fashioned and sometimes downright patronising in both style and content.

Here again, to avoid unwanted congestion, World Cup Mass starts are held with only the 30 top ranking athletes on the start line. The quality of content was another crucial factor in The Wiggles' success. As in Sprint races, competitors must ski one 150 m penalty loop for each miss. Increasing reliability, falling cost and simplicity of operation saw many children in this age group learning how to operate CD players and VCRs themselves. In this 15 km (12.5 km for women) competition, there are four bouts of shooting; two standing, two prone. Crucially for the Wiggles, both the VCR and the CD player were ideally suited to repeat playing, and like TV before them, both technologies were almost immediately harnessed to entertain the preschool children of the late Baby Boomer generation (most of whom had grown up with TV as a constant childhood companion and babysitter). In the Mass start, all biathletes start at the same time and the first across the finish line wins. By the early 1990s, the introduction of the new compact disc technology saw CD players emulating the near-universal market penetration of TVs and VCRs.

To prevent awkward and/or dangerous crowding in the skiing track, and undercapacity at the shooting range, World Cup Pursuits are held with only the 60 top ranking biathletes after the preceding race. Just as they did with television in the 1960s, Australians took up the domestic video cassette recorder in the 1980s with extraordinary speed, with the result that, by the end of the 1980s there was both a TV and a VCR in more than 90% of Australian households. The distance is 12.5 km for men and 10 km for women, there are four shooting bouts (two prone, two standing), and each miss means a penalty loop of 150 m. By the time the Wiggles became established, two important changes had taken place in the Australian household. The contestant crossing the finish line first is the winner. But they are very good dancers, and help out when they want to. In a Pursuit, biathletes' starts are separated by their time difference from a previous race, most commonly a Sprint. They don't speak at all, and they are very mischievous and cheeky.

Competitors' starts are staggered, normally by 30 seconds, but sometimes by only 20 seconds. The Wagglets are Wags the Dog's 'children' as such, in which he takes care of them in his house. For each miss, a penalty loop of 150 m must be skied before the race can be continued. The Wiggles have a rather unusual house, mainly because it's alive! The house can be very moody and stubborn, and in the movie didn't even recognise the wiggles! When the password 'sillypants' is stated, the house opens up like a lolly wrapper, much to the house's dislike, as he says he thinks he's falling apart. The biathlete shoots twice, once prone and once standing, for a total of 10 shots. She was only featured in the video/DVD appropriately named 'Wiggle Bay'. The sprint is 10 km for men and 7.5 km for women. She helped the wiggles find their adrift rowing boat when they visited the bay.

On all modern biathlon ranges, the targets are self-indicating, in that they flip from black to white when hit, giving the biathlete as well as the spectators instant visual feedback for each shot fired. Magdelena is a mermaid who lives in the ocean near Wiggle Bay. Prone shooting target diameter is 45 mm, standing is 115 mm. In The Wiggles Movie: Magical Adventure, Officer Beaples had a speaking role. There are five circular targets to be hit in each shooting round. The part is typically mimed; she usually communicates through her whistle, and has many young police officers to teach (As seen on the Wiggles Live Video). The target range shooting distance is 50 m. Dressed resembling a British bobby, Officer Beaples is played by a woman in drag.

The rifles use .22 LR ammunition and are bolt action. He longs to be like his grandfather Waldo the Great, and finally realized his dream after winning a magic competition in the Wiggles Movie. The biathlete carries the 3.5 kg small bore rifle including ammunition in magazines on her/his back during the race. Wally is a children's magician who, despite his regular tries, fails at being a great magician. Minimal ski length is 4 cm less than the height of the skier. Vanessa taught Dorothy how to dance, but was only featured in one video. No other equipment than skis and ski poles may be used for moving along the track. (A special note is that the video 'Toot Toot Chugga Chugga' Video had a special note at the end acknowledging John's death).

All cross-country skiing techniques are permitted in biathlon, which means that the free technique is usually the preferred one, being the fastest. The first Wiggles Chef was John Field Snr., until his death. The large display screens commonly set up at biathlon arenas, as well as the information graphics shown as part of the TV picture, will typically list the split time of the fastest contestant at each intermediate point and the time differences to the first five to ten runners-up. He was played by former Crowded House drummer Paul Hester until his death in 2005. To keep track of the contestants' progress and relative standing throughout a race, split times (intermediate times) are taken at several points along the skiing track and upon finishing each shooting round. A friendly cook who taught the wiggles how to cook cold spaghetti, mashed bananas, and hot potatoes. For each shooting round, the biathlete must hit five targets; each missed target must be "atoned for" in one of three ways, depending on the competition format:.
There are also some minor extra characters featured in some of the videos/DVDs:.

As in most races, the contestant with the shortest total time wins. Originally played by Anthony Field and his brother Paul Field, Captain Feathersword is now permanently played by Paul Paddick. Depending on the shooting performance, extra distance or time is added to the contestant's total running distance/time. A running joke with Captain Feathersword is his use of the phrase "Well, blow me down!", which usually results in the characters nearest him obeying his wishes by blowing him to the ground with a gust of breath. In short, a biathlon competition consists of a race in which contestants ski around a cross-country track, and where the total distance is broken up by either two or four shooting rounds, half in prone position, the other half standing. His catch-phrase is "Ahoy There, Me Hearties". However, the concise description given below, along with the section on competition format, should be enough for a spectator to understand what is going on at a biathlon stadium whether actually being there or at home watching a televised biathlon event. Captain Feathersword is a friendly pirate, and is characterised by his pirate coat and hat, eyepatch and eponymous sword made of feathers.

The complete rules of biathlon is given in the official IBU rule book (see External links, below).
. Contrary to the Olympics and World Championships (BWCH), the World Cup (BWC) is an entire winter season of (mostly) weekly races, where the medalists are those with the highest sums of World Cup points at the end of the season. He is said to have a bubbly personality and loves a good joke. The following articles list major international biathlon events and medalists. Henry lives under the sea and is the leader of the Underwater Big Band. Presidents of the UIPMB/IBU:. Henry likes to wave to all his friends simultaneously, an easily accomplished feat considering his eight tentacles.

In 1993, the biathlon branch of the UIPMB created the International Biathlon Union (IBU), which officially separated from the UIPMB in 1998. He wears tartan clothes, a straw hat and black polished shoes on the end of every tentacle. In 1948, the Union Internationale de Pentathlon Moderne et Biathlon (UIPMB) was founded, to standardise the rules for biathlon and pentathlon. Henry is a fun-loving octopus with purple skin. At Albertville in 1992, women were first allowed in Olympic biathlon.
. The first World Championship in the sport was held in 1958 in Austria, and in 1960 the sport was finally included in the Olympic Games. He believes everyone is his friend and is said to love having a good time.

Called military patrol, the combination of skiing and shooting was demonstrated at the Olympic Winter Games in 1924, 1928, 1936 and 1948, but did not gain Olympic recognition then, as the small number of competing countries disagreed on the rules (see also Governing body, below). Wags is a skilled Tango dancer. Gradually the sport became more common throughout Scandinavia as an alternative training for the military. Wags cannot talk, but The Wiggles understand him when he barks. The first known competition took place in 1767 when border patrol companies competed against each other. Wags also enjoys digging in his garden. The sport has its origins in an exercise for Norwegian soldiers. He enjoys eating, and is said to keep The Wiggles up all night if he gets hungry.

. Wags is a tall, brown, furry dog with floppy ears and a happy face. The broadcast distribution being one indicator, the constellation of a sport's main sponsors usually gives a similar indication of popularity: for biathlon, these are the Germany-based companies E.ON Ruhrgas (energy), Krombacher (beer), and Viessmann (boilers and other heating systems). Dorothy has a heart of gold and is a very friendly dinosaur. Biathlon events are broadcast most regularly where the sport enjoys its greatest popularity, namely Germany (ARD, ZDF), Norway (NRK), Finland (YLE), Sweden (SVT), Russia (RTR), Belarus (TVR), Slovenia (RTV), and Estonia (ETV); it is also broadcast on European-wide Eurosport. She loves her birthday as The Wiggles always make it a very special fun day for her. Another popular variant is summer biathlon, which combines cross-country running with riflery. She loves dancing, and is known to do ballet, Irish, Scottish, and line dancing.

Biathlon, however, refers specifically to the winter sport that combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. Dorothy is 5 Dinosaur years old, and is very wise for her age. The name biathlon is commonly confused with duathlon, the term used to describe any sporting event made up of two disciplines. She wears a floppy white hat and enjoys eating roses. by having to use an "extra cartridge" (placed at the shooting range) to finish off the target; only three such "extras" are available for each round, and a penalty loop must be made for each of the targets still remaining after expending the "extras". Dorothy is a large green dinosaur with yellow spots. by having one minute added to one's total skiing time, or. Occasionally touring without The Wiggles as "Dorothy The Dinosaur And Friends", they enable the group to maintain a touring presence even when The Wiggles themselves are off the road.

by making a skiing round in a 150 m penalty loop, typically taking 20–30 seconds for top-level biathletes to complete (running time depending on weather/snow conditions),. They were developed in the early 1990s, and were originally played by group members and by Anthony's brother Paul, but are now played by hired actors. Biathlon World Cup champions. Aside from the four Wiggles, there are many secondary characters that appear in their many songs and shows. Biathlon World Championships. American audiences responded warmly to the freewheeling Wiggles style and they now regularly sell out major venues around the country. Olympic medalists in biathlon. audiences with the same easygoing presentation style that they had used in Australia.

From  1992: Anders Besseberg (Norway). Their early experiences touring in the USA with the 'Barney' shows -- which reportedly featured high production values but lacked spontaneity -- showed The Wiggles that they could break through to U.S. 1988–1992: Igor Novikov (USSR/Russia). Their stage routines are often augmented by some gentle ironic humour aimed at the adults, although this is never done cynically, or at the expense of the children. 1960–1988: Sven Thofelt, (Sweden). They have, notably, made few concessions to the cultural imperatives supposedly prevalent in the American media, and they still display the same relaxed, accessible and good-natured performance style that was evident in their earlier Australian work. 1949–1960: Gustaf Dyrssen (Sweden). Although their live shows have lately become increasingly sophisticated, the Wiggles' basic style has changed little since their earliest days and a Wiggles concert can be enjoyed by parents and children alike.

1948–1949: Tom Wiborn (Sweden). Aside from their commitment, dedication and sheer hard work, a crucial aspect in The Wiggles' American success has been their on-stage spontaneity, humour and talent for improvisation. They now regularly play to packed houses across the USA, have performed at both Madison Square Garden and Radio City Music Hall, and have appeared on TV shows such as the NBC "Today" show and the Regis Philbin talk show, as well as featuring in several Thanksgiving Parades in New York City. Since it was originally shown from 1997 to 1999, and in 2002 (also entitled Network Wiggles or Lights, Camera, Action, Wiggles!) on ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) Kids, The Wiggles are now seen nationally in the USA on the Disney Channel and as a result their popularity has sky-rocketed. After an initial slow entry into the United States market (touring with the organization that produces the Barney & Friends children's show), the Wiggles secured a breakthrough deal with The Walt Disney Company, and saw their videos and TV series screened to preschool children across America.

that they had their first major international success. Their first overseas tours brought the Wiggles to the United States and Britain in the mid-1990s, but like many other Australian acts, it was in the U.S. They performed literally hundreds of shows each year, their videos and CDs sold in ever increasing numbers and they regularly won every major industry award in their category. After several years of relentless touring around Australia, the group were firmly established as the most successful children's entertainment act Australia had ever seen.

With international exposure, the group became extremely popular in the United States and elsewhere in the 2000s. Their first CD, released in 1991, is the only recording to feature founding member Philip Wilcher, who left the group soon after the CD's release. Their combination of kid-friendly songs, videos and characters were a quick hit in Australia in the early 1990s. The group was able to capitalise on the contacts and goodwill that The Cockroaches had built up during the 1980s -- that band toured regularly and successfully throughout Australia -- and they also built up their performance expertise and public exposure with occasional busking around Sydney, although they would undoubtedly be mobbed if they were to attempt this today.

They developed a hugely successful system where receipts for their shows were split with the centres, who were able to use the popular Wiggles concerts as lucrative fund-raising events. Originally a five-piece group, the Wiggles began their career playing at pre-schools and childcare centres. They have also been able to successfully respond to criticism of the content of their act by pointing out the sound theoretical and educational bases of their work. They have been (unfairly) accused of pandering to allegedly 'trendy' notions of political correctness, but the Wiggles were in that case able to defend themselves by pointing out that the composition of the group -- including the Chinese-Australian Jeff Fatt -- was a matter of pure happenstance which arose out of a simple necessity, rather than being a concept deliberately created to try and exploit a market or imitate an existing act (e.g Hi-5).

Although there is now regular coverage of their ongoing financial success, The Wiggles near-universal popularity has meant that they have only rarely been victims of the so-called "tall poppy syndrome", though they have occasionally come in for some mild criticism. In the process their success has spawned a slew of lesser imitators including The Hooley Dooleys and the 'concept' children's group Hi-5. Thanks to a productive (if occasionally difficult) alliance with the ABC, the Wiggles created a distinctive blend of music, comedy and educational content that saw them rise over the course of the 1990s to become the most popular and successful children's group in Australian entertainment history, and then in turn become one of the most successful Australian entertainment exports of all time. Children's entertainment was up to this time dominated by presence of the long-running ABC-TV children's program Playschool, who marketed much of the most successful children's material, and whose various presenters often performed at children's concerts and similar events.

In Australia it had become a small but profitable "cottage industry" which operated in fairly traditional styles. Up to this time, the mass-market potential of entertainment for preschool children had yet to be tapped to its full extent. Their shows were such a hit with young audiences that they soon found themselves in regular demand and they soon discovered that could earn considerably more working as children's entertainers than as preschool teachers (a profession that is notoriously underpaid in Australia). The original five Wiggles initially teamed up to produce a music performance project for their studies.

Like Field, Cook had experience playing on the booming Sydney live rock scene of that period; he had played bass in a minor Sydney 1980s pop band, Finger Guns, while working as a clerk at the Australian Taxation Office. Page, the youngest of the group, had come into the course straight from high school, but Cook, Field and Wilcher were all mature-age students. Field enrolled in early childhood studies at Macquarie University in Sydney in the late 1980s, and it was here that he met three other students who were also musicians -- classically trained pianist Philip Wilcher, guitarist and singer Murray Cook and vocalist Greg Page. Anthony Field (vocals, guitar) and Jeff Fatt (vocals, keyboards) had been members of The Cockroaches, a popular eighties pub rock band who toured widely and had a number of Top 40 hits in Australia.

The animal characters also enabled them to create a (hugely successful) range of merchandising items that did not have to rely exclusively on the Wiggles own personae. The inclusion of the Dorothy character was one of their most successful innovations, since it enabled them to tap into the massive expansion of interest of dinosaurs among young children. The basic act was later augmented with popular supporting characters -- the parodic pirate Captain Feathersword (Paul Paddick) and the animal characters Dorothy the Dinosaur, Henry the Octopus and Wags the Dog. This simple device also allows the Wiggles to go about in public (at least in Australia) with relative ease, since children rarely recognise them without their trademark colors.

The colour coding is -- Greg, yellow; Murray, red; Anthony, blue; Jeff, purple. Very early on, they adopted differently coloured shirts for each member, which assisted their recognition by very young children, and they invariably wear the Wiggles 'uniform' when appearing as The Wiggles in the media or in public. The Wiggles originally consisted of five people, but for almost all of their career the lineup has consisted of the remaining four founder members. The Wiggles also adapted the Bob Wills tune "Silver Bells That Ring In The Night" with a duck-like "quack quack-quack" in the refrain.

Much of the Wiggles' music was written by John Field, the brother of the blue wiggle - Anthony. Another distinctive feature of the group's songs is easy-to-repeat gestures, such as the "romp bomp a chomp" hand motions in the song "Dorothy the Dinosaur". These costumed characters include Dorothy the Dinosaur (a horticulturalist dinosaur who eats only roses), Captain Feathersword (a harmless pirate), Wags the Dog, Henry the Octopus, and Officer Beaples (a female police officer who communicates through mime). Wiggles songs are often about simple topics that children can relate to: sleeping ("Rock A Bye Bear", "Wake Up Jeff"), eating ("Fruit Salad"), animals ("Do the Monkey", "Rockabye Your Bear", "Ponies") or the cast of characters created for their home videos and TV shows.

. The Wiggles are an Australian band who specialise in creating and performing music for preschool children. Anthony Wiggle Field. Jeff Wiggle Fatt.

Murray Wiggle Cook. Greg Wiggle Page. Jeff - single with no children. Anthony - married with two children.

Greg - married with two children. Murray - married with two children. Jeff: 177 cm (5'10"). Anthony: 182cm (6').

Murray: 192 cm (6'3 1/2"). Greg: 194 cm (6'4 1/2"). Jeff: 21st July. Murray: 30th June.

Anthony: 8th May. Greg: 16th January. Greg wears a yellow shirt, drives the Big Red Car, and often performs magic tricks. Originally, he wore a green shirt but switched to blue because Dorothy is green.

Anthony eats healthy food, especially fruit salad. Murray wears a red shirt and plays a guitar. Jeff wears a purple shirt and falls asleep (children are asked to shout 'Wake Up Jeff!').