The third stage of the Biathlon World Cup started in Hochfilzen, Austria.
The victory in the women's sprint was unexpectedly celebrated by the Belarusian Dinara Alimbekova.
The first personal medal in her career allowed her to rise to second place in the overall KM standings.
The best result among Russian women was shown by Ulyana Kaisheva.
With one penalty, she finished 18th, over 50 seconds behind the winner.
During the move of all biathlon teams from Kontiolahti to Hochfilzen, fans could only hope that no one would become infected with the coronavirus and would not be forced to quarantine while others were playing for medals.
The first test results in Austria were good news - all 700 tests of athletes, coaches and officials showed negative results.
Nothing could interfere with the smooth running of the Friday sprints.
The stage in Hochfilzen was opened by girls.
They had to run 7.5 km, approaching two firing lines.
In the first starting group, there were practically no favorites, with the exception of the Italian Dorothea Wierer.
The two-time winner of the Big Crystal Globe, after winning the individual race in Kontiolahti, has not yet claimed the podium, but this time she was able to quickly go through the first lap and shoot cleanly on a prone, setting a very high benchmark for other biathletes.
Only Dinara Alimbekova was able to cope with it before the main characters appeared at a distance.
According to the results of the first two stages of KM, the Olympic champion was recognized as the best young biathlete, and she began to live up to expectations.
She won almost three seconds against Wierer and took the lead after the first shooting.
A very fast German woman Denise Herrman tried to move Alimbekova, but one uncovered target prevented her.
Soon the first Russian athletes appeared on the shooting range, but their accuracy left much to be desired.
Tamara Voronina, who failed to finish the pursuit in Kontiolahti, was 43 seconds behind Alimbekova due to a penalty loop.
Evgenia Pavlova was seventh before the firing line, but a miss threw her to the end of the second ten.
The World Cup leader Hannah Eberg also failed to move the Belarusian biathlete from the first line, who was also let down by the shooting.
After the penalty loop, the Swede returned to the track behind Pavlova.
The younger sister of Eberg, Elvira, was still able to bypass the Belarusian.
The bronze medalist of the previous sprint race won four seconds over Alimbekova.
Following the results of the second shooting, Alimbekova's claims for a debut medal in the World Cup became even stronger.
While Wierer had to run an extra 150 meters, the Belarusian went to the track after a clean stance and increased her lead to more than 20 seconds.
The Russians failed shooting - Voronina and Pavlova made five mistakes for two, calling into question their participation in the pursuit.
The Eberg sisters, however, also did not avoid mistakes and Alimbekova was no longer disturbed.
Meanwhile, at the cutoff after the first shooting, new contenders for medals appeared, among whom was the Russian woman.
Ulyana Kaisheva, who performed well in the recent relay, was able to rise to the intermediate fifth line, 12 seconds behind Elvira Eberg.
True, she was immediately pushed by the German Franziska Preuss and the Norwegian Marthe Olsbu-Roiseland.
As a result, Kaisheva did not manage to stay among the leaders - already on the second lap she began to lag behind, and on the stand she missed with the last shot.
From the top ten she had to retreat to the second.
Preuss and Olsbu-Roiseland also made mistakes, but due to their high speed, they continued to claim, if not for victory, then for medals.
At the finish, they took intermediate places in the top three, with a lag of 10 and 17 seconds from Alimbekova.
The hopes of domestic fans for Irina Kazakevich and Svetlana Mironova, who started in the later group, did not come true either.
The first did not close one target and ended up finishing outside the second ten, losing more than a minute to Alimbekova.
Mironova, on the other hand, not only did not show the usual speed, but also failed on her bench, making three misses.
Together with Voronina, she could not break into the graze.
Closer to the end of the sprint, Larisa Kuklina entered the distance.
She did not compete for almost two weeks due to an injury sustained in the individual race at the first stage in Kontiolhati.
But she did not intervene in the arguments of the favorites, having made a mistake in the first shooting and finished in 31st place (the third result among Russians).
Kaisheva is on the 18th line, and Kazakevich is on the 23rd.
Russian biathletes were left without medals in the 28th race in a row, repeating the anti-record set last season.
The last word in the race remained with the Norwegian Tiril Eckhoff.
The winner of the last pursuit also started the race with one mistake on the standing position, but she was great in the move - at the finish she and Alimbekova were separated by only 8.5 seconds.
Eckhoff beat Preuss in the silver medal dispute and left her compatriot Olsbu-Roiseland without bronze.
The Belarusian, who won the Olympic gold in Pyeongchang 2018, celebrated her first victory in the World Cup.
Dzinara Alimbekava's fantastic season continues with her first-ever World Cup victory!
🤩
🥇 Dzinara Alimbekava @olympicbelarus 🇧🇾
🥈 @ TirilEckhoff @ NSSF_Biathlon 🇳🇴
🥉 @ PreussFranziska @ skiverband 🇩🇪
Rewatch the women's sprint in Hochfilzen on https://t.co/bk5aBBso9Qpic.twitter.com/aT52
- IBU World Cup (@IBU_WC) December 11, 2020