Lyle Barber Nelson (born February 9, 1949 in

McCall, Idaho McCall is a resort town on the western edge of Valley County, Idaho, United States. Named after its founder, Tom McCall, it is situated on the southern shore of Payette Lake, near the center of the Payette National Forest. The population was 2,991 ...

) is a retired American

biathlete The biathlon is a winter sport that combines cross-country skiing (sport), cross-country skiing and shooting sports, rifle shooting. It is treated as a race, with contestants skiing through a cross-country trail whose distance is divided into sh ...

. He represented USA at four Olympics. At his last Olympics in 1988, he was the flag bearer. In 1976 he finished 35th in the Individual 20K biathlon. He led off the American team with Dennis Donahue, John Morton and Peter Dascoulias as they finished 11th place in the 30K relay. In 1980, when USA hosted at Lake Placid, he finished 19th in the new 10K sprint biathlon and joined

Martin Hagen Martin Hagen (born October 3, 1954) is an American biathlete. He competed at the 1976 Winter Olympics, the 1980 Winter Olympics and the 1984 Winter Olympics The 1984 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XIV Olympic Winter Games (Serbo-C ...

, Donald Nielsen Jr. and Peter Hoag Jr. in finishing 8th in the 30K relay. In 1984, he returned to the Individual 20K biathlon, finishing 26th. He joined Nielsen again along with Bill Carow and Josh Thompson in finishing 11th in the 30K relay. In 1988, as the 39 year old veteran, he was selected to carry the flag at the 1988 Opening Ceremonies held just north of his home in

Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, makin ...

. In the 10K sprint, he finished tied with Sverre Istad for 30th place and joined Thompson, Curt Schreiner and Darin Binning in finishing 9th in the

relay A relay Electromechanical relay schematic showing a control coil, four pairs of normally open and one pair of normally closed contacts An automotive-style miniature relay with the dust cover taken off A relay is an electrically operated switch ...

Personal life

Prior to the Olympics, he attended the

United States Military Academy The United States Military Academy (USMA), also known metonymically as West Point or simply as Army, is a United States service academy in West Point, New York. It was originally established as a fort, since it sits on strategic high groun ...

, graduating in 1971 and joining the

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

, rising to the rank of

Captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...

. He later attended the

University of Southern California The University of Southern California (USC, SC, or Southern Cal) is a Private university, private research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Founded in 1880 by Robert M. Widney, it is the oldest private research university in C ...

, earning his master's degree. As an administrator, he was the president of the United States Biathlon Association. He worked on trying to expand the sport into a

summer biathlon The IBU Summer Biathlon is a sporting event organized by the International Biathlon Union (IBU) which combines trail running or roller skiing and shooting sports, rifle shooting, or sometimes trail running and rifle shooting. It is modeled afte ...

program to attract some of the 16 million runners into biathlon. He served as a commentator at the

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which Sinking of the MS Estonia, sank in ...

and

1998 Olympics The 1998 Winter Olympics, officially known as the and commonly known as Nagano 1998 ( ja, 長野1998), was a winter multi-sport event held from 7 to 22 February 1998, mainly in Nagano, Japan, with some events taking place in the ...

. When the Olympics returned to the USA at

Salt Lake City Salt Lake City (often shortened to Salt Lake and abbreviated as SLC) is the Capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Utah, most populous city of Utah, United States. It is the county seat, seat of Salt Lake County, Utah, Sal ...

2002 File:2002 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 2002 Winter Olympics are held in Salt Lake City; Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother and her daughter Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon die; East Timor gains East Timor independence, indepe ...

, he served as the venue director for the biathlon. He is currently Director of Community Relations and Health Promotion at St. Luke’s McCall Hospital in his home town.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nelson, Lyle 1949 births American male biathletes Biathletes at the 1976 Winter Olympics Biathletes at the 1980 Winter Olympics Biathletes at the 1984 Winter Olympics Biathletes at the 1988 Winter Olympics Living people Olympic biathletes of the United States