The third stage of the skiing World Cup of the season has started in Dresden.
On the first day, the piggy bank of the Russian national team was replenished with another award.
The bronze medal was won by Gleb Retivykh in the individual skating sprint.
Bronze of the Zealous and Bolshunov's "tree"
The last three years, the sprint stage of the World Cup in Dresden took place in January after the Tour de Ski, but this time it was decided to hold it before the main ski race in order to attract more strong athletes.
In the case of Norway, Sweden and Finland, this plan did not work - these teams have long since withdrawn from the competition for fear of contracting the coronavirus.
But the Russian team, led by Alexander Bolshunov, changes in the calendar still forced to pay attention to an almost flat track without interesting climbs.
There are not many competitions this season, and even such a stage with exclusively sprint races would be useful before the Tour de Ski.
In addition to the World Cup leader Bolshunov, Gleb Retivykh, Artyom Maltsev and Alexander Terentyev were able to overcome the qualification.
In the preliminary races, their main rivals were identified - the winner of the sprint in Davos, Federico Pellegrino from Italy, the bronze medalist of the same competition, Andrew Young from Great Britain and the very fast Frenchman Luc Chavan.
Fortunately, all three in the playoffs could not compete with the Russians until the final.
Only one Russian skier did not pass from the quarterfinals to the next round.
Artyom Maltsev, as a typical remote control, tried to sit behind in his race and roll to the finish line, but the narrow track in Dresden that was melting in the heat did not allow doing this at all.
She demanded to seize leadership from the very beginning, as Bolshunov, Zetivykh and Terentyev did.
The three of them ended up in the same semifinal race, in which again the tactics with early leadership worked and allowed Bolshunov and the Retivykh to continue the fight for medals.
From the other race, Pellegrino and Young, as expected, went further, and Shavana could not be selected as a lucky loser.
In the final, Pellegrino was able to make a starting spurt, thanks to which he booked first place for himself.
Bolshunov and Retivykh were waiting for the finish line in order to at least impose a fight on it on the Italian, but Young was able to bypass them even before the last turn.
The Briton cleverly passed the Russians, even though during the race he broke a stick and replaced the equipment.
Pellegrino and Young remained in the first two places, and the Zealous won the bronze.
Bolshunov took fourth place, which did not prevent him from remaining the leader of the World Cup in the overall standings, and second after Pellegrino in the sprint classification.
It is a fine line between charging it full speed and tackling the hilly course of Dresden Sprint the right way!
⚖️Federico Pellegrino found the right balance and defends his Sprint leader Bib all along the way 💪 # fiscrosscountrypic.twitter.com / cKjtGKGFm5
- FIS Cross-Country (@FISCrossCountry) December 19, 2020
Wrong tactics of Nepryaeva and the fall of Sorina
In the women's competition, the Russians failed to win medals, although the composition of the participants was even less strong than a week ago in Davos.
The American Rosie Brennan, who won the last two races and took the lead in all the World Cup scores, did not go to the start.
In her absence, Tatyana Sorina could have intercepted the yellow jersey, and for this she had to win by all means.
But for all the leaders of the Russian national team, the playoff stage was unsuccessful.
The first to finish the fight was Yulia Stupak.
During the race, she had contact with rivals, because of which she lost a lot of precious time, and as a result, the silver medalist of the last race of the World Cup became the fourth.
Then Sorina dropped out.
She was unlucky enough to face the Italian Alice Canchlini.
They both fell and no longer counted on reaching the semifinals.
Natalia Nepryaeva was the best in her quarterfinals and beat two future participants in the final Amamaria Lampic from Slovenia and Lucia Scardoni from Italy.
But in the next race, the Russian woman made a mistake Maltsev - she got stuck behind the backs of her rivals and even with her finishing spurt could not take at least second place to continue the fight.
Another semifinal was even faster, and Nepryaeva did not become a lucky loser.
As a result, the gold went to the Swiss Nadine Shendrich, who had already won medals several times at the World Cup stages, but never won.
The American team was not left without a medal thanks to Sofia Caldwell-Hamilton, who snatched silver in a dispute with Lampich.
It is a fine line between charging it full speed and tackling the hilly course of Dresden Sprint the right way!
⚖️Federico Pellegrino found the right balance and defends his Sprint leader Bib all along the way 💪 # fiscrosscountrypic.twitter.com / cKjtGKGFm5
- FIS Cross-Country (@FISCrossCountry) December 19, 2020