The Tank Biathlon is currently on-going as part of the International Army Games 2019 event, organized by Russia.
It began on August 3rd and will run through August 17th.
The Tank Biathlon 2019 is an international tank crews race with various obstacles. All the crews perform under equal conditions and the final outcome may depend on the crews’ maneuverability and coordinated work. Every year thousands of people gather together to watch how tank aces operate their combat vehicles, overcome various obstacles and hit the targets.
The number of participants increases every year. Nowadays number of participating countries more than two dozens, and there are indisputable favorites of each game among them. The tank crews from Russia, Belarus, China, Kazakhstan comprise the bulk of leaders and prize-winners of past years. The winners will be determined only by the skills level of tankmen and results of the final race.
Tank crews from over 20 countries will participate in the “Tank Biathlon – 2019”. The crews will demonstrate their skills in driving, shooting and obstacle crossing. The military ground is composed of various sites with ramparts, ditches, firing emplacements and lines.
The Russian Ministry of Defense’s TV channel – Zvezda published a day-one video of the event.
Each participating country takes part with 3 crews.
The competition was officially confirmed by teams from 25 countries from Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America: Azerbaijan, Angola, Armenia, Belarus, Venezuela, Vietnam, Zimbabwe, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Cuba, Kuwait, Laos, Mongolia , Myanmar, Russia, Serbia, Syria, Sudan, Tajikistan, Uganda, Uzbekistan, Sri Lanka and South Africa.
The teams of the participating countries will compete in orienting themselves on the battlefield, the art of driving, shooting accuracy and fire control with Russian T-72B3 tanks, the team of the Republic of Belarus with the T-72BME (Belarusian version of the modernization of the tank), and the China with the modernized Type-96B tanks.
Competitions are held along the route with natural and artificial obstacles, combat tracks, shooting areas and will consist of the following stages: individual race, semi-final and the final stage of the “Relay”.
At the bottom of the Tank Biathlon website there is a list of the obstacles, as well as the targets.
The event began with a “Tank Ballet” performance, which can be seen in the following video:
On the first day of the event, China ranked first, followed by Belarus.
The livestream of the event can be followed here, through to August 17th when the finals will take place.
Separately, for those who prefer to watch it without any commentary, Ruptly also uploaded videos of the event:
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There are likely to be more videos and pictures released in the following days, since the event is only in its 4th day out of 14 as of August 7th.
Loving it! Tanks are awesome. Some NATO countries should have joined, because A: it would have looked cool to have some Leopard 2’s there too and B: why not? Being part of a Russian sponsored tank competition is now suddenly endorsing the ‘occupation of the Crimea’, the war in the Ukraine, Russian meddling with the US elections, the Russian intervention in Syria, the Skripals, Russian meddling in every election and whatever else they like to blame Russia of.
I remember back in the 80’s during the Cold War, people loved it whenever the USSR sent something our way to participate or show something off. Because people took it as a sign of progress and detente. We already placed Russia under sanctions for everything bad they dad. Now we are going to act as petulant spoiled little children too? Sweet 16 brats who refuse to join each other’s parties because they’re having a hissy fit?
Soo boring! Tank biathlon! A bunch of T90 painted in all kind of colors running on a poligon.
Super fun event! When do you see tanks going for it with live ammo! Great spectacle.