Hakkinen eyes U.S.' first Olympic biathlon medal

	Jay Hakkinen, shown here in the men's 20km biathlon, finished 13th in the 12.5-kilometer pursuit at the Salt Lake City Games in 2002. Donald Miralle/Getty Images
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For an athlete with eyes of radar precision, Jay Hakkinen recalls one thing he couldn't even see from his own house.

"The neighbors," says Hakkinen, a native of Kasilof, Alaska, (pop. 470). "My family couldn't see anyone from where I grew up. It was just us. The neighbors were somewhere out there beyond the trees."

These days, Hakkinen has his sights on something no U.S. biathlete has been able to find: an Olympic medal. Since the sport joined the Olympic program at the 1960 Squaw Valley Games, no American has skied and shot his way into the top 10.

Until the '02 Salt Lake City Games, the demarcation point was No. 14. John Burritt, Peter Karns, Josh Thompson and Jeremy Teela had reached, but never surpassed, that threshold before Hakkinen recorded a 13th-place finish in the 12.5-kilometer pursuit in Utah.

For all that the United States has accomplished at the Winter Olympics -- a Miracle on Ice, an Eric Heiden juggernaut, a million medals in figure skating -- it has never come close to winning an Olympic medal in biathlon, the sport that combines heart-taxing cross-country skiing with heart-taming precision shooting. Hakkinen is the country's only legit hope to break that slump at the Turin Games in February. If he does, you'd be more likely to see his face on a package of salmon than on a cereal box.

In wintertime, Hakkinen, 28, bases himself in Germany, bouncing from World Cup stop to World Cup stop, negotiating cheap travel and lodging arrangements. He has equipment sponsorships for winter skis and summer roller skis and he earns sponsorship money from, yes, a wild salmon producer. Yet Hakkinen went into debt one season in between Olympics when he battled tonsillitis and failed to make the national team.

"There's no profit margin for me," he says. "I'm a non-profit organization."

In the summer, Hakkinen returns to Alaska, lives with his parents, Brian and Yvonne, and helps the family fish for wild salmon on Bristol Bay.

"We've been fishing commercially since I was 6," he says. "It's cold, wet, damp and you don't get much sleep, but when the fish hit the net like crazy and the boat's full, it's kind of perfect. It's Alaska. It's what I grew up with as long as I can remember."

Hakkinen remembers a post office, a local store, a gas station a school that was 12 miles away, and the bevy of trucks with snow tires that got people there in the mornings.

He recalls the incident that took him away from his first sporting love and ironically paved the way for his present one. As a freshman high school hockey player, Hakkinen survived a broken thumb and forefinger. A broken collarbone finally did in the defenseman for good.

"We were skating diagonally to each other," he says, "and I ran my shoulder in to his legs. I remember being in pain, but I remember the guy didn't score."