Mark Kirchner

Former German biathlete and current biathlon coach.

At the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville, he won medals in all three competitions, two years later he was the flag bearer for the German delegation at the opening ceremony at the Winter Games in Lillehammer and won gold in the biathlon relay. After his interim sporting dominance at major events, Kirchner only rarely achieved top results in the second half of the 1990s. After no longer qualifying for the biathlon World Cup team in 1998/99, he briefly competed as a cross-country skier and retired from competitive sport in December 1999.

Since the end of his career, Kirchner has worked as a biathlon coach for the German Ski Association, initially mainly at the Oberhof base, where he coached Arnd Peiffer, among others. From 2010 to 2023, he was head coach of the men's national team. After the 2018 Winter Olympics, he also took over nominal responsibility for the women as the sole national biathlon coach until 2022, although he was not involved in coaching them. Kirchner is regarded as a calm and structured coach who largely avoids public appearances and is held in high regard by the athletes. The athletes he coached won several world championship titles in the 2010s, and Arnd Peiffer also became Olympic champion in 2018.