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Heartbeat takes you inside the world of the unique Olympic sport of biathlon - a sport that combines the heart-pumping aerobics of cross country skiing combined with the precision element of marksmanship. The US Biathlon podcast brings you close to the athletes to dissect one of the most popularity of Olympic Winter Games sports.
[00:00:01] Tom Kelly: Fede Fontana. Welcome. Thank you for joining us again on Heartbeat. You're a past guest and you're just getting ready for the Olympics?
[00:00:08] Fede Fontana: Yeah. Hi, Tom. Thank you so much for having me as a guest again. I think last time was a couple of years ago when we met in, uh, in Utah in Soldier Hollow, actually, if I remember. Well.
[00:00:22] Tom Kelly: Yeah. And we also, we also did a, I think we did a show from Antholz, uh, following you around in the, uh, in the team cabins, which I always love. I love getting behind the scenes where you work.
[00:00:35] Fede Fontana: Oh, yeah. I forgot about it. Yeah, exactly. You were there. So.
[00:00:41] Tom Kelly: So we're recording this during race weekend in Nové Mesto. The last World Cup before the world gathers in Antholz for the Olympic Winter Games. What is the atmosphere right now around the team, knowing that the team is set right now for men and for women, and you're getting ready to go to the biggest show in the sport.
[00:00:59] Fede Fontana: Yeah. I mean, you know, uh, usually the last workup that comes before, uh, before the Olympic game is a little bit special. You know, uh, there's a good mix of, uh, athletes, you know, also from other nations. Some is skipping these events. Someone else is coming, you know, and was a little bit the same for us. You know, a couple of athletes, uh, the coaches decided to bring them earlier to the, to Ridnaun, where we are having the, the preparation camp for the Olympic Games. And here we are having basically dihydroheroin, uh, Margie Freed, Maxime Germain and Campbell Wright competing in Nové Mesto because the coaches decided that was good for them to have one more week of competition. So, uh, I think it's going to be good is, uh, you know, the atmosphere here is the feeling I have, uh, we traveled here on Monday after the Ruhpolding World Cup. The athletes and the staff seems pretty relaxed, you know, motivated of course, focused on the competitions that are coming up. But, uh, I think the mood is really high. And the excitement, of course, you can feel it, but I haven't seen, you know, like people nervous because they think about the big event, you know, and this I think is very important because, I mean, the season is long anyway.
[00:02:30] Fede Fontana: Uh, the game, the Games is the event that every athletes, uh, is waiting for, and to qualify is an honor. Uh, when you make it, it's for sure something that stays with you for the entire life. But what I always say to our athletes, especially when we talk and also to the staff, is that okay? These are just two weeks of an entire competing season, of course, is the biggest event we have in sports, but also the chances to show our qualities in the competition. World Cup or IBU Cup, whatever level of competition it is, is very important. So, like I said, uh, I wish that the atmosphere stays like this. I'm pretty sure that when we hit the ground in Antholz, you know, the excitement and also like, a little bit, uh, the nervousness will, uh, rise, raise a little bit, but, uh, so far, I think you can feel a lot of confidence. And, uh. Yeah, like, they believe in the what? The work that they did put in to reach this moment. And I'm pretty sure that we are going to be there. Ready. So but first, let's focus on this important week of competition. And, uh, because the possibilities and the chances are there. So let's let's get them.
[00:03:57] Tom Kelly: You are a bit of a legend. As a wax technician and now the general manager for the US Biathlon team. Give us a little bit of your background and how you ended up in this role with the US Team.
[00:04:09] Fede Fontana: Well, thank you. About the legend I don't know, let's say that, uh, looking around also at the field of ski technician, I am probably one of the guys that right now is around since longer time, you know, like the new generation is coming up pretty, pretty strong. But, uh, let's say in my role, you know, head technician or whatever, there are still some old dinosaur like me around.
[00:04:39] Tom Kelly: I don't know about that.
[00:04:42] Fede Fontana: I'm not that old, but, uh, I'm since over 15 years around, uh, so is I. What can I say? It's my passion is my job, and, uh, I love it so is probably the greatest thing I can, I can imagine.
[00:05:02] Tom Kelly: So tell us. Tell us about your hometown in Italy.
[00:05:07] Fede Fontana: Yeah, this is like a really small village. I told you once we were talking, uh, is a really small mountain village in the Apennines. Uh, the name is. We have a big, uh, history and tradition in Nordic sports. Uh, the town is around 750, 800 people. And we are right now four technicians working at the highest level, uh, in the biathlon world. So something quite special if you think that is such, such a small village in the middle of nowhere. But we grew up with skis because back in the days where we still had real winter, uh, the town was like, let's say maybe in August you had, you could go around with shorts and t shirts and all the rest was cold, so the only way to do sports was a little bit. Either cross-country skiing or cross-country skiing. And then I grew up, you know, competing. Uh, unfortunately, I wasn't that strong enough to make it to a national team, but I always kept. You know, the desire to be up and, uh, work at the at the highest level and somehow, you know. It turned out to be like, okay, I couldn't reach any medals, uh, with my possibility as an athlete. Uh, now, I really want to help athletes to reach this goal. So it everything started the first time. For example, now that we are in Nové Mesto, I was here in Nové Mesto in 2012 and 2013 for the World Championship. Uh, I was working with the Polish team, where I had my first, uh, two medals as a ski technicians. And I remember it was a very successful world champs also for the US Biathlon team, with the silver medal of Tim Burke and an amazing sixth place from Russell Currier. And yeah, I mean I'm since then 2015. So this year is kind of the unbelievable for me as ten years with US Biathlon and uh, the fourth Olympic Games actually.
[00:07:23] Tom Kelly: How did you guys how did you and your colleagues, uh, get the nickname of the Wax Cowboys?
[00:07:31] Fede Fontana: Yeah, this is a little bit, uh, some sort of a funny story, you know, like, uh, the Norwegian, uh, works team. They named themselves Wax Mafia. So we were thinking, like, come on, guys, we need to, you know, social media, social media era and whatever. Instagram or Instagram. And they were, you know, posting and making content. And a friend of us said one day, come on, you guys need a name. Uh, you know, and then we started to to play around a little bit with the names. And for him, this guy was like, come on, us Team Cowboys. Wax Cowboys is the perfect name for us. And then it started. And now, you know, it's kind of fun posting against each other with the Norwegian and uh, which we are good friends, you know, it's just fun. And somehow it became some sort of a brand.
[00:08:30] Tom Kelly: It's it's just kind of funny. And I love that kind of camaraderie. I want to explore a little bit in into, uh, ski testing and ski selection. I think a lot of people may think that as a, as a ski technician that you come to the race and you put the wax on, the skis are ready to go. But it's a it's a long, long process. So why don't you start by talking about the testing of skis that you do even before the season begins?
[00:08:55] Fede Fontana: Yeah. Uh, I wish it was like you just said that you come to the venue, you grab a pair of skis, and you put some wax on and you're ready to go. But there is much more work, like tons of work behind. And, uh, many times the coach says that by athletes are made in summer and they can say a little bit the same things. Talking about skis. Good skis are made in summer. Good technicians, uh, also are made in summer. We are lucky to have, you know, a great support from our federation from us biathlon because they it gives us the possibility to work, you know, with the same volume and uh, let's say almost, uh, the same, uh, technologies that the big nation have. Uh, we work with a system that basically we, I don't know, 12 months per year. Our, uh, season doesn't end, uh, at the end of March with the last World Cup. Uh, but the work continues. This means that, you know, of course, we take we are also human. We take a couple of weeks off, you know, after the last competition, but mid of April, uh, we are ready to hit the snow again. And this is from, uh, a perspective of the workflow. Very important because if you leave, you know, uh, too much time between the end of the season and when you start to test again, uh, you know, the head is not fresh again. It's not fresh anymore. Uh, so we try to go on snow again as soon as possible, as long as we have the business in the, in the head.
[00:10:49] Fede Fontana: And from there, uh, we keep working, and we work following, you know, a scheduled plan. So normally, the April's ski testing, we go five, six days on natural snow. Where to get, you know, the chance to ski on, uh, wet snow, which is a condition that unfortunately, we have more and more often during the winter. And this camp in April is mostly on retesting the race fleets of the athletes. But also. And this is what we did last springtime in 2025, in Livigno, we invited four different walks companies. These four companies are the ones that we didn't. We work pretty close together. We have some sort of cooperation to develop products. So we started already the phase of the R&D, uh, for products. Then we may. It comes already, you know, like you can start to visit the ski companies to pick and select the first batches of the new production series. You go on snow with those keys and then June, July, August, September, and then you increase the volume every month because more, more, more races are coming. But also we try to schedule in a way that we focus every camp on a certain area, whether, uh, walks development or grind development or hand structure development. So is everything following a workflow that is really, uh, articulate and uh, and let's say on some, some ways also complicated.
[00:12:44] Fede Fontana: So you need to, to be there. And this gives us really an advantage because actually few of the big nations, they don't work this way, and we try to use as much as possible as many different places. You know for sure. The ski tunnel in Oberhof is one of the places that we use the most, uh, Glacier. This last summer was unfortunately not the greatest, uh, place where to test skis, because the winter 2024 to 2025 was really poor of precipitation in the Alps. So the glacier did struggled a lot. And they normally in May, when we used to go to the to the glacier wasn't possible because the snow was already gone. And then they had to close the glacier until uh, mid October this year when normally you can start to use after the summer break already at the beginning of September, the glacier, but it didn't really impact the quality and the effectiveness of our work, because when we talk about R&D of products and grinds, uh, is preferable to have, you know, stable and consistent condition. So I'm talking about wind precipitation. So you need a snow that is consistent. And this way you can really collect data that can be useful and analyzed. And for this the ski tunnel, whether Oberoth or Torsby in Sweden, are the places where you can get those data and those analytics a little bit nailed in, in a better way. And then you can analyze even deeper.
[00:14:34] Tom Kelly: Yeah. Fetty, when you're doing this testing, what is it that you're looking for from the skis? I imagine you're looking for speed, but are there other characteristics that you're looking for as you select the actual skis to use?
[00:14:48] Fede Fontana: Yeah. So basically when we select the race keys for the athletes, we know every technician follows a couple of athletes. So in my case, for example I'm in charge of Campbell vrai Maxime Germain and Lucinda Anderson. I know these keys that they like the I know the type of skier they are. And then is a, you know, is a close contact with the with the ski company and with the reps of the company. So what I do is, uh, I know which are the gaps that I need to fill or the skills that I need to replace. So I just go to the ski company and I start to pick skis. Normally the wax company, they also test skis so they know which series are the best. And, uh, when I tell them, okay, I need, for example, for Maxime, uh, this model, with these flags, with this type of, you know, measurements. Uh, they work together with me on getting me these keys that matches the, these, this, these features. And then we put them on snow. We go through, I might say, uh, for example, I think especially for, uh, an athlete like Campbell, uh, I went through over 60 pairs of skis this summer, and I kept for the race fleet, uh, 12 pairs.
[00:16:21] Tom Kelly: But how many? How many pairs of skis do athletes travel with?
[00:16:26] Fede Fontana: So we have in between from a normal, uh, the standard. Let's say we go in between 20 and 40 pairs right now, uh, a race fleet of a Campbell, right. Or a Maxime Germain. I have for both of them. Each, uh, over 40 pairs and are usually. An example is that, for example, for Campbell, Rossignol is a ski brand. Uh, supports him very well, and we have a very good cooperation together. And every time I need to add one ski, uh, they give it to me, you know, and, uh, also, like when they have one ski that they know. Look, we tested at the venue, for example, they test their fleet that they have here in November for this condition. And they say, okay, look, this is a very good ski. You should try it against the one you have and often is like this, that it goes right away at the start. But yeah, it's a lot of skis, a lot of work. In the end you end up the season when you look the skis that you use, probably from 40 pairs of skis, you you did compete with ten pairs, 12 pairs and the rest. They were just tested but never made it to the start gate.
[00:17:49] Tom Kelly: I think about the truck that carries all of these skis for the US biathlon team. From race to race. That's a lot of skis, isn't it?
[00:17:58] Fede Fontana: Yeah. Uh, you say truck, we don't. We don't own a truck, you know, and this is one of the pieces of technology or technology, let's say a piece of infrastructure that is still missing, uh, in the entire picture. Uh, we have to, uh, cargo vans and, uh, you know, I don't have a picture here with me. And in the podcast, you you you would not see it, but, uh, you could see a cargo van fully packed on skis. And this is actually one of the gap that we have still somehow to to reduce and fill, you know, the big nations, they travel with these works trucks, you know, where Let's say more efficiency because for us, you know, try to imagine the technician, me included, when we have to move from Scandinavia to Central Europe. We are on the road for 2 or 3 days. You arrive at the venue, build up these containers and this week to week. So having a work stack is something that brings efficiency. Because if I see our colleague from the wax mafia, the Norwegian, they, they, they, they arrive at the venue, they press a couple of buttons, the, the trailer pulls out, you know, and in 15 minutes they are scraping. The first pair of skis for us takes two hours. This doesn't mean doesn't mean that they are smarter, but they can play a little bit more efficiency. But they are not better than us because.
[00:19:36] Tom Kelly: It's always fascinating. So if we have any listeners who want to help to support a wax truck, we'll get you in touch with Fede. We're going to take a short break. And when we come back, we're going to talk with Fede Fontana about athletic success and also looking ahead to the Olympics in adults. We'll be right back on Heartbeat.
[00:19:59] Tom Kelly: We're back with Fede Fontana coming to you live from Nové Mesto today, the final World Cup before the Olympics in Anderson. We're going to talk about those Olympics in just a minute, but I'm kind of curious. We've heard all about the ski selection and the work that goes on behind the scenes to help provide athletes with the best tools possible. But as a wax technician, when you have an athlete who has success, how does how do you how do you and your colleagues, how do you look at the role that you played in that success in providing, providing the best skis possible to the athletes?
[00:20:31] Fede Fontana: Yeah, the let's say that in biathlon, the ski speed became more and more important. Uh, in the, in the last years and in the modern biathlon the ski technician will place for sure a huge role, a huge role for the success of the athletes. Uh, of course, in biathlon you have many factors that, uh, play an important role. But the skis are definitely one of them. Uh, because without a great ski pair of skis, you cannot win a race. Because especially if you look, uh, at this season, I was really impressed about the level, for example, that you see how tight is in the front. So in the top ten places is everything very tight. So we are really talking about where the ski that is three seconds per loop faster can make the difference between a medal or not. So we are a key role in the entire picture. And uh, yeah, is getting more and more important. You know, is, uh, the way we work with the athletes changed also, uh, during the years a few years ago with the before the flu or ban, uh, you know, we used to test those on a race day with the athletes, but right now, we had to we had to take this part away because otherwise we would need to bring the athletes to the venue a couple of hours before they go to for the zeroing.
[00:22:13] Fede Fontana: And this is would have too much stress. Stress on the athletes on a race day. So it became even more a matter of trust. Trusting each other. You know, uh, and knowing each other. I know the athletes I work with. They trust me. They trust me. So they know that I doing with my stuff. The best job to give them the best key. And for us right now is even more important. The feedback after the race, the feedback from the athletes. Because from there we can learn a lot. Because we can. Okay, look, this was not 100% today. Then we need to react for the next time. So the trust and the cooperation together, the working together, believing in each other, work and role is, uh, really a key for success.
[00:23:14] Tom Kelly: When the athletes do arrive at the stadium to prepare for the race. How many pairs of skis would you have called it down to for them to help make that final decision? Or do you decide which pair we decide?
[00:23:27] Fede Fontana: So this is what I, I was explaining, uh, at the beginning, right now, on a race day, we do the entire testing. So that's why we need to know Really. Also like the shape, you know, if the athlete is, uh, strong or if he's tired because that is a really relevant, uh, point, you know, because if I give to the athletes, which is tired, a ski with a flex that is too hard, uh, is not going to help his legs to recover. So right now we decide the technician decide the skis. So we have every technician, like I said at the beginning, is responsible for the ski selection of and for the race fleet of, uh, certain athletes. And, uh, we know their skis very well. And on the skis, uh, I start usually for my guys and for Lucinda with in between 8 and 12 pairs, what I bring out for the first test and then, uh, of course, it's just one pair that goes to the start, but this is usually a normal test Ski test setup on race days in between 8 and 12 pairs.
[00:24:42] Tom Kelly: Feet at the finish of a race where the athletes had some success. They've won a medal at the World Championships. They've maybe set a personal best. I know that you and your team are still busy with your work, but you must find some time to take a little bit of pride and have a little celebration when that athlete crosses the finish line, right?
[00:25:04] Fede Fontana: Yeah, absolutely. For us is, uh, you know, is the reason we are doing this, this job, uh, to see one of your athletes succeeding with the skis that you prepared, you know, you know, that you were part of that puzzle, you know, an important part of that puzzle. And there's a lot of we are proud of what? What we do. Of course, if things goes wrong, you know, you cannot have every day the best. And sometime, you know, can be something that goes wrong. But, uh, in the day you have the, the big results, a medal or a great race day, and the athletes comes back and tells you that these keys were very fast, they were rockets or whatever. Then is for us very, very, very nice. And let's say this is the fuel that push us to give all what we have every day.
[00:26:05] Tom Kelly: Let's talk. Let's talk about antidotes. And as you look across outdoor snow sports in the Olympics, it's very seldom that a discipline will or a sport will come to a venue that is truly one of the best in their sport, a venue that they see every year. But that's the case now with biathlon going to Antholz. What does it mean to be going into a venue like Antholz that you know so well, you've been to, been to so frequently and having the biggest event, the Olympics in that venue?
[00:26:38] Fede Fontana: Yeah. Antholz is, uh, for sure special. Special for us. Biathlon. We had, uh, many great results there. We we did medal with Susan Dunklee at the World Championships in 2020. Uh, I would say right now, like you said, is probably, if not the best, one of the very best, uh, venue of the of the biathlon circuit, I would say now is Antholz the Mecca of biathlon. This place is just amazing. Um, yeah, we know Antholz very well. I mean, uh, I've been preparing skis in Antholz for almost two decades. Uh, but what I say always is, I say to myself and also to, to my technician, is that there's no venue that you know enough. Usually we go in Antholz this week. Like now we are in Nové Mesto, but usually is Antholz where you have very wintry conditions. Pretty cold, but sometimes we had snow that was down to -15 -16 Celsius. Um, in February is a little bit a question mark. You can have a totally different condition. You can have the same condition as now, but can be also pretty warm. So, uh, that's why we did spend a lot of time also last year with the ski testing there in February with, uh, a group of R&D people. Uh, they're running ski tests for us. We did stop right away after the World Cup last year. And so we did this year, at the beginning of January during our Olympic trials.
[00:28:32] Fede Fontana: Uh, we stayed there five days supporting the ski waxing for the trials, but also testing as much as possible because from January 6th they closed the venue for the entire month of January. And there I was very surprised because when I drove to Antholz on January 1st, I thought, okay, we are going to be there, we are going to met Norwegian, Swedes, Germans. But I was surprised at just the US biathlon team was there testing skis. So maybe this is just because other teams, they think they think you know how we know handles. We go there since 20 years. But for me, no matter which kind of condition you can expect or that what whatever condition you will get in February, every test counts. You can always learn. You can learn from the venue. You can learn from the weather there. So every test counts. And I'm not the person that likes to leave pieces behind. I want to, you know, at the end of the game, I'm pretty sure it's going to be a successful Olympic game for us. The trajectory is showing this, but I don't want to be at the 21st of February and looking backward and say we left something undone. You know, we want to look at myself in the mirror or talk with my guys and say, look, guys, we did everything. We didn't forget. We didn't. Yeah we did. We haven't left anything behind, basically.
[00:30:13] Tom Kelly: Given that the Olympics is a much bigger event than a World Cup, will you have to change any of your normal year-to-year protocols in going to Antholz because it's the Olympics?
[00:30:27] Fede Fontana: Well, we for sure like on a Pre-Olympic season. Uh, we pushed a little bit, uh, harder, you know, uh, not because it's the Olympic and not because the world championship count less, you know, but for sure, the Olympic for the reason that comes just every four years. You want to give that little bit more, you know, uh, so just to give you an idea, we spent from April until the beginning of the season over 60 days of snow during the off season, the process did run, uh, pretty much the same, but we increased the volume of the the project and the way we did run the project. Thanks to the US Biathlon Federation, we were able to hire one of the key technicians, uh, also for the or all year long. Also during the summer, and this was one of the biggest and most important changes because Luca Tomasi is the guy, is the one that, uh, is in charge of walks and application of the waxes. So this is really like a a key person in the waxing system. So what we did was pushing even more on the R&D with wax on wax companies and wax technologies. But we also brought forward, you know, the grinding system and the grinding project with Giovanni Ferrari.
[00:32:09] Fede Fontana: So, uh, we did work hard. I can say that we we were not resting much. We actually also we started breaking down our entire machine. So we know that the machine like our group. You know the system, the way we test is how we do things. We said we were sitting at the table and we said, okay, let's break the system down. We start from beginning again and we want to collect data. We want to check this is can sound funny in in one way. But just to give you an idea, we did test 20 different wax cleaner to see the one that cleaned the ski better and the one that gives you a better performance on skis. So we started from there and then we developed waxes that, uh, we have exclusively produced for us. And they are going to stay exclusive for us until the end of the season. So I think we are in a very good spot here. We also signed a technical partnership with a with a wax company. And uh, so this gives us another piece to add to the puzzle where we can say, okay, this gap to the big one is getting smaller and smaller.
[00:33:39] Tom Kelly: Well, it's fascinating stuff and we appreciate you sharing all of this with our listeners here on Heartbeat. We're going to close it off with our On Target section. I have just a few other what I think will be simple questions for you. And just to kick it off as a ski technician, you have been around the world, you've been to all of the great venues, but do you have a favorite stop on the World Cup tour, one that you really look forward to each year?
[00:34:04] Fede Fontana: Wow. Tough question. So the easiest answer is probably Ruhpolding, because for one week I can sleep at home. As you know, I live in Ruhpolding since many years, so that's for sure a good one. Uh, but that's not really my favorite one. Let's say I have many places, uh, that, you know, uh, keeps, uh, keep a special place in my heart. Many of the places where we had great results and medals. Uh, so it's always nice to go back there because the memories comes back, you know? Um, but, yeah, uh, that's not really the favorite. Favorite one.
[00:34:50] Tom Kelly: Okay. For fans who are going to Antholz for the Olympics coming up in just a short time, where's the best place to get a pizza in Antholz.
[00:35:00] Fede Fontana: Oh, at the Pizzeria Camping in Antholz. Very good pizza. But, uh, I think it's going to be pretty tough to get a table, especially because they don't take reservation. And, uh, is really like a cult place, you know, like, everyone wants to go there once in Antholz.
[00:35:21] Tom Kelly: Can the fans just use your name to get a table?
[00:35:23] Fede Fontana: Uh, I don't think it's going to work. Maybe they should try to use our name as a.
[00:35:28] Tom Kelly: Yeah. That's right. I'll ask him. I'll ask him the same question. And the last question for you. And this one's probably going to be difficult, but if you had to describe what your job meant to you, what it meant to you in your heart, but you only had one word. What's the one word to describe what your job means to you? Preparing the best skis for the best biathletes who?
[00:35:51] Fede Fontana: Just one word.
[00:35:52] Tom Kelly: You said just one word. I want to make you think everything. That's a new one. I love that, I love that. Well, we appreciate you coming on. You have been a fun guest the times we've had you here on Heartbeat. We wish you all the best. I hope you get a little bit of a break before you head to the Olympics, and we'll look forward to seeing you cheering when the US Biathlon Team gets its first medal in Antholz. Thank you very much. Fede.
[00:36:19] Fede Fontana: Thanks, Tom. And, uh, to all the listeners, uh, cheer for US Biathlon, we need you.