Biathlon at the 1960 Winter Olympics competing nations; in parentheses are the number of national competitors. Biathlon at the 1960 Winter Olympics Biathlon at the 1960 Winter Olympics consisted of one biathlon event, held at McKinney Creek Stadium, Tahoma, California. The event occurred on 21 February 1960. This was the first appearance of modern biathlon in the Olympic Games. In 1924, a military patrol event was held. Some sources do not include this military patrol race as an Olympic event, but the IOC considers it an event within biathlon. Klas Lestander of Sweden won the first modern biathlon Olympic gold medal. Nine nations sent biathletes to
1960 Winter Olympics status of some of the players overshadowed the event. Canadian Olympic officials objected to the use of "professional amateurs" by Eastern Bloc countries, and especially the Soviet Union. They alleged that the Soviets were giving their elite hockey players phantom jobs in the military that allowed them to play hockey full-time, which gave Soviet teams an advantage that they used to dominate Olympic hockey tournaments for nearly 30 years. This issue started coming to light during the 1960 Games and would culminate in a Canadian boycott of the Olympic hockey tournament at the 1972 and 1976 Winter Olympics. The team