Biathlon at the 1960 Winter Olympics - individual race (men)

The men's 20 km individual race at the 1960 Winter Olympics was held on February 4 at McKinney Creek Stadium. The competition was attended by 30 athletes from 9 countries.

Men's Biathlon Individual at the VIII Winter Olympics
Location	McKinney Creek Stadium
Dates	February 4, 1960
Of the participants	thirty
Teams	9

The race included 4 firing lines. At each of the lines, the targets were located at different distances: on the first - 250 m, on the second - 200 m, on the third - 150 m, on the fourth - 100 m. For each miss, 2 minutes of penalty were charged. Biathletes used live rifles. The normal starting interval in those years was 2 minutes, but due to low temperatures it was reduced to 1 minute.

Before the final five shots, only three participants managed to close 15 targets out of 15. Alexander Privalov had an advantage of more than 2 minutes over the Swede Klas Lestander and 38-year-old Norwegian veteran Henry Hermansen . But the final shooting was decisive. Lestander closed all 5 targets and became the only one who knocked out 20 out of 20. Privalov missed three times and gave the chance to the Finn Antti Türväinenen , who made two misses at the first firing lines. Hermansen spent the last shooting even worse - 4 misses, and fell as a result to 10th place.

The best skier of the day, Frenchman Victor Arbez, showed time almost 7 and a half minutes better than Olympic champion Klas Lestander , but was able to hit only 2 targets. As a result, 36 penalty minutes were added to his time, and he finished the race in 25th place.