The women's 15-kilometre individual biathlon competition at the 2002 Winter Olympics was held on 11 February, at Soldier Hollow. Competitors raced over five loops of a 3.0-kilometre skiing course, shooting four times, twice prone and twice standing. Each miss resulted in one minute being added to a competitor's skiing time.

Results

The Biathlon World Cup test event in 2001 was won by Magdalena Forsberg, who shot clear and won by more than a minute from Martina Zellner, a German who was not selected for her national team for the 2002 Games.World Cup 7 - 15 km Individual Results from biathlonworld.com, retrieved 6 February 2013 Forsberg was also the defending world champion and World Cup champion in the distance , and led the World Cup in the discipline, having won two of the three Individual races earlier in the season. However despite a long history of success, she had never won an Olympic medal. Liv Grete Skjelbreid-Poirée won the other event of the season, at Antholz, while Ekaterina Dafovska was the defending Olympic champion.

The 25-year-old Andrea Henkel started before some of her more heralded competition, but recovered well after missing a shot on her second loop, making all ten of her remaining shots to add just the single minute to her ski time. Katrin Apel and Uschi Disl each beat Henkel's time going into the final shoot, despite missing shots earlier, but both missed three times on the final shoot, ending up outside the top 10. Olga Pyleva set the fastest times after the second and third shoots, leading Henkel by more than a minute, but sent two wide on the last shoot, and ended up 45 seconds behind the leading German. Defending champion Ekaterina Dafovska missed one shot in the race, like Henkel, but her ski speed wasn't enough to get close to a medal.- Competition Analysis, Women's 15 km Individual - SLOC

Liv Grete Skjelbreid-Poirée had an identical shooting line to Henkel, and while she was ahead of the German on the first two shoots, she fell behind on ski time, and ended up seven seconds back in second, well ahead of Pyleva, then in bronze position. The final serious challenge was from Magdalena Forsberg, who had won many World Championships, but did not have an Olympic medal. Forsberg was well over a minute clear of Henkel and Poirée as she approached the final shoot, but missed twice, losing any chance at gold. She did manage to get in for bronze, displacing Pyleva.

The race was started at 11:00.Final results Rank Bib Name Country Result Penalties Deficit 26 Andrea Henkel 47:29.1 1 (0+1+0+0) 56 Liv Grete Poirée 47:37.0 1 (0+1+0+0) 65 Magdalena Forsberg 48:08.3 2 (0+0+0+2) 43 Olga Pyleva 48:14.0 2 (0+0+0+2) 48 Ekaterina Dafovska 48:15.5 1 (0+1+0+0) 44 Olga Nazarova 48:29.9 1 (0+1+0+0) +1:00.8 41 Martina Glagow 48:34.2 1 (1+0+0+0) +1:05.1 29 Svetlana Ishmuratova 48:45.0 2 (1+0+0+1) +1:15.9 5 Martina Jašicová 48:47.5 2 (0+1+0+1) +1:18.4 10 47 Albina Akhatova 49:06.1 2 (2+0+0+0) +1:37.0 11 40 Florence Baverel-Robert 49:10.2 2 (0+0+2+0) +1:41.1 12 39 Uschi Disl 49:43.4 4 (0+1+0+3) +2:14.3 13 52 Katja Holanti 49:52.3 2 (0+0+1+1) +2:23.2 14 45 Soňa Mihoková 50:00.7 3 (0+1+1+1) +2:31.6 15 55 Sun Ribo 50:04.7 1 (0+1+0+0) +2:35.6 16 4 Sylvie Becaert 50:09.0 2 (0+0+0+2) +2:39.9 17 69 Liu Xianying 50:09.4 0 (0+0+0+0) +2:40.3 18 30 Katrin Apel 50:16.7 5 (0+2+0+3) +2:47.6 19 57 Kateřina Losmanová 50:42.0 3 (1+1+1+0) +3:12.9 20 68 Pavlina Filipova 50:47.5 3 (2+0+0+1) +3:18.4 21 24 Corinne Niogret 50:49.6 1 (0+1+0+0) +3:20.5 22 66 Ann Elen Skjelbreid 50:51.1 3 (0+1+1+1) +3:22.0 23 21 Zdeňka Vejnarová 50:54.7 1 (0+0+0+1) +3:25.6 24 59 Olena Petrova 51:05.7 1 (0+0+1+0) +3:36.6 25 71 Lucija Larisi 51:12.1 2 (0+1+0+1) +3:43.0 26 60 Delphyne Burlet 51:19.2 2 (1+0+1+0) +3:50.1 27 62 Oksana Yakovlieva 51:22.2 2 (1+0+0+1) +3:53.1 28 67 Irena Česneková 51:28.0 2 (0+0+2+0) +3:58.9 29 23 Oksana Khvostenko 51:34.4 0 (0+0+0+0) +4:05.3 30 17 Gunn Margit Andreassen 51:42.9 3 (0+1+1+1) +4:13.8 31 15 Rachel Steer 51:50.6 2 (0+1+1+0) +4:21.5 32 42 Iva Karagiozova 51:59.3 2 (1+1+0+0) +4:30.2 33 63 Marcela Pavkovčeková 52:03.7 4 (1+0+3+0) +4:34.6 34 58 Olena Zubrilova 52:10.7 3 (1+1+1+0) +4:41.6 35 13 Eva Háková 52:11.0 3 (1+1+0+1) +4:41.9 36 50 Michela Ponza 52:13.6 2 (1+0+1+0) +4:44.5 37 31 Olga Zaitseva 52:26.2 4 (1+0+1+2) +4:57.1 38 37 Kseniya Zikunkova 52:26.8 3 (1+0+0+2) +4:57.7 39 46 Linda Tjørhom 52:34.0 4 (1+1+0+2) +5:04.9 40 25 Sanna-Leena Perunka 52:48.8 3 (1+0+0+2) +5:19.7 41 36 Tadeja Brankovič 53:08.9 4 (1+2+0+1) +5:39.8 42 51 Hiromi Suga 53:10.6 3 (1+0+1+1) +5:41.5 43 2 Irina Nikulchina 53:16.7 6 (3+2+0+1) +5:47.6 44 8 Kong Yingchao 53:38.0 2 (1+0+0+1) +6:08.9 45 61 Tamami Tanaka 53:40.4 4 (3+1+0+0) +6:11.3 46 38 Yu Shumei 53:43.0 5 (1+2+0+2) +6:13.9 47 6 Katja Haller 53:44.0 2 (2+0+0+0) +6:14.9 48 49 Outi Kettunen 53:48.1 4 (0+1+1+2) +6:19.0 49 64 Saskia Santer 54:14.7 7 (2+2+2+1) +6:45.6 50 22 Ryoko Takahashi 54:18.0 4 (0+1+0+3) +6:48.9 51 9 Lyudmila Lysenko 54:25.4 4 (4+0+0+0) +6:56.3 52 14 Éva Tófalvi 54:36.7 3 (2+0+1+0) +7:07.6 53 32 Anna Murínová 54:39.2 5 (1+2+2+0) +7:10.1 54 7 Anna Stera-Kustucz 54:47.1 4 (2+1+0+1) +7:18.0 55 54 Kristina Sabasteanski 55:00.9 4 (0+1+0+3) +7:31.8 56 53 Andreja Grašič 55:06.4 8 (2+3+2+1) +7:37.3 57 1 Dijana Grudiček 55:50.3 7 (0+4+1+2) +8:21.2 58 27 Ivett Szöllősi 56:34.8 1 (0+0+0+1) +9:05.7 59 20 Kara Salmela 57:25.9 8 (1+1+2+4) +9:56.8 60 34 Yelena Dubok 57:32.5 5 (0+2+1+2) 61 18 Dana Cojocea 57:37.0 5 (2+1+0+2) 62 28 Valentina Ciurina 58:40.8 6 (1+1+3+1) 63 33 Andžela Brice 59:20.9 6 (1+2+1+2) 64 16 Mami Shindo 59:38.6 8 (3+2+2+1) 65 3 Zsuzsanna Bekecs 5 (2+2+0+1) 66 35 Kim Ja-youn 7 (2+2+0+3) 67 12 Claudia Barrenechea 3 (1+1+1+0) 68 11 Despoina Vavatsi 7 (0+2+1+4) 69 10 Natalia Lovece 12 (4+2+2+4) 19 Nathalie Santer DNF 70 Lyudmila Ananko

References

Sports-Reference.com - Women's 15 km Individual