His breakthrough came in 1994 when he featured on his first World Cup podium in a sprint race held in Bad Gastein, Austria.

On 20 February 2014, Bjørndalen was elected to an eight-year term at the International Olympic Committee's athlete commission.

[7] In 1993, at the age of 19, Bjørndalen first came into focus by winning 3 out of 4 possible gold medals at the Junior Biathlon World Championships, which among other things led to him being chosen to represent Norway in the 1994 Olympics, at the cost of highly merited biathlete Eirik Kvalfoss.

[10] He is the only biathlete ever to win all biathlon events in a single Winter Olympics (2002 Salt Lake City Games).

In addition, he had won all three competitions staged at the Olympic test event in Salt Lake City the previous year.

This was the second time that Norway had won a title in this event, with the other being at the 2002 Winter Olympics (also anchored by Bjørndalen).

With his gold medal in 10 km sprint at the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics, he tied fellow Norwegian Bjørn Dæhlie for most Winter Olympic medals, with 12 in total,[13] before overtaking Dæhlie by winning his second gold of the Games as part of the Norwegian mixed relay team.

[15] Bjørndalen has also achieved 14 individual gold medals in the Norwegian Championship, biathlon, summer event: sprint (7) and pursuit (7).

[16] In January 2018 Arne Botnan, the sporting director for Norwegian biathlon, announced that Bjørndalen would not be selected for the 2018 Winter Olympics, after he failed to achieve the qualifying standard of a top six finish in a World Cup race before the Norwegian Biathlon Association was due to nominate its Olympic squad on the 15th of that month.

[17] However, he did travel to the Games after being accredited as part of the Belarusian Olympic delegation as a coach, in order to support Darya Domracheva.

[18] On 3 April 2018 Bjørndalen announced his retirement from competition, explaining that his form had been affected by heart murmurs several times during the previous season.

Bjørndalen lay in third place in the standings going into the last three races of the season in Holmenkollen, with Poirée in first, and Fischer in second.

Bjørndalen closed out the season by winning all three events (sprint, pursuit, and mass start) at the Holmenkollen ski festival biathlon competition.

On 30 December 2006 Bjørndalen took part in the Biathlon World Team Challenge in Gelsenkirchen in the Veltins Arena.

[21] In Oberhof, coming down from training in the heights, Bjørndalen performed below standard for the season, and finishing only 30th and 5th in the individual competitions.

Bjørndalen started off the season suffering from the effects of long-term illness, but still placed second in both of the pursuit events.

After the break, he returned with victories in both the sprint and pursuit events in Ruhpolding and a third place in the mass start in Oberhof.

At the Biathlon World Championships 2009 in Pyeongchang, during the men's 12.5 km pursuit, Bjørndalen with at least 15 other competitors accidentally skied the wrong way at the start of the first lap due to the bad marking.

A jury meeting decided to give all these athletes a one-minute time penalty, following a complaint from the Russian team.

Both brothers were part of the Norwegian team that took the silver medal in the men's relay at the 1998 Winter Olympics.

In April 2016, along with announcing that he will continue his career until the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, Bjørndalen confirmed that he was in a relationship with Belarusian biathlete Darya Domracheva, and that she was pregnant with the couple's first child.

In 2008, a nearly three meter tall bronze statue of Bjørndalen, created by sculptor Kirsten Kokkin, was erected in his hometown of Simostranda, Norway.

[35] In February 2014, Bjørndalen was voted Best Male Athlete of the 2014 Winter Olympics by International Sports Press Association.

[36] In November 2014, Bjørndalen was awarded Best Male Athlete of the 2014 Winter Olympics by the Association des Comités Nationaux Olympiques.

[37] Bjørndalen first participated in the FIS Cross-Country World Cup in Finland in the 10 kilometre freestyle event in a small town called Muonio in November 1998, finishing 23rd.

One month later he once again came in 2nd place, this time losing out to Per Elofsson in the 30 km freestyle mass-start event in Ramsau, Austria.

On 18 November 2006 Bjørndalen made history by becoming the first male biathlete to win a FIS Cross-Country World Cup event in the Swedish town Gällivare.

[38] In 2007 his countryman, and fellow biathlete Lars Berger won the 15 km cross-country event at the World Championship in 2007.

[40] Bjørndalen has won the World Team Challenge biathlon exhibition event in Gelsenkirchen (held at the Veltins-Arena, the home ground of football club Schalke 04) in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006.

He also won a bronze together with his wife Darya Domracheva in 2018[41] Ole Einar Bjørndalen finished second in the 2003 Dobbiaco-Cortina, a long-distance cross-country skiing event, (42 km) in Italy in the town of Cortina.