Pyeongchang, South Korea - The result of Sunday's chaotic men's pursuit race at the biathlon world championships in Pyeongchang could be contested in front of the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS), Russian media said on Monday.

The appeal jury of the sport's controlling body IBU on Sunday changed an earlier decision by race organizers to penalize the race winner Ole Einar Bjoerndalen and several other biathletes for leaving the track early in the race.

A 60 second-time penalty given to Bjoerndalen pushed him down to third place, while Russian Maxim Tchoudov was promoted from second to first and Alexander Os from third to second.

The Norwegian federation lodged an appeal against that decision, which the IBU appeal jury upheld on Sunday.

The Russian sports website allsport. ru said on Monday that Russian biathlon officials were considering appealing to CAS against the IBU decision.

Tchoudov, meanwhile, said that he was considering not attending Tuesday's victory ceremony. "I can't understand how breaking the rules can go without any repercussions."

He said the decision was creating a precedent. "The situation is not an easy one for me, but I will certainly compete in the 20- kilometre race on Tuesday."

Also on Monday, the coach of the Swedish biathlon team Wolfgang Pichler said that his athletes had been receiving death threats from Russia for some time.

Swedish biathletes and biathlon officials are amongst the most vociferous in the fight against doping and three Russians were last week announced as having failed dope tests.

The three, Ekaterina Iourieva, Albina Akhatova and Dmitri Yaroshenko all left Pyeongchang after the announcement and returned to Moscow.

Pichler said that he was calling on the IBU to get guarantees for his biathletes security ahead of the final World Cup event in Chanty- Mansijsk.

"Our athletes are scared," he said.

Pichler said that he himself had been pushed around by a Russian official. "We are scared for our life. If the IBU does not ensure our safety we will not be able to go to Russia to compete. We have several athletes who are in with a chance in the World Cup, but security is paramount."

Swedish biathletes had previously discussed boycotting the final race in Chanty-Mansijsk.

IBU President Anders Besseberg said he was concerned about the threats and promised that the IBU executive would deal with the issue at its meeting on Friday. "We consider this a very serious issue," he said. (dpa)