Three minutes behind in the relay and 22 misses in the pursuit: Russian biathletes unsuccessfully completed the KM stage in Ostersund

A promising stage for Reztsova

After winning the first medal in the new season of the World Cup, men also expected awards in the relay from Russian biathletes. Even if they have recently shown not the best results in personal races, they always look decent in the team and claim to be in the top-3. Moreover, the composition of the domestic four turned out to be quite even. There was a place in it for both the fast Kristina Reztsova and Svetlana Mironova, and the reliable Ulyana Nigmatullina and Larisa Kuklina on the lines. Although initially it was clear that in order to compete with Norwegians, Swedes and French women, the wards of Mikhail Shashilov need to work perfectly.

Unfortunately, not everyone succeeded in this. No questions arose only to Reztsova, who took part in the relay race within the KM for the first time in a year and a half. This time, she not only showed an excellent move, but also completely mastered the shooting. Christina confidently closed all ten targets and tried to break away from her pursuers. It didn't work out. The 25-year-old athlete sent Kuklina into battle first, but practically on the same foot as Dorothea Wierer and Eva Kristain-Puskarchikova.

Larisa, not famous for her high speed, quickly lost her leadership.

The company of the Swede Mona Brorsson was the swift-footed Denise Herrmann.

For the Russian woman, the main thing was to work out exactly at the turn.

Alas, she did not cope with this task, allowing two misfires and leaving the bench 28.7 seconds behind Brorsson.

Then it began to grow before our eyes and at the mark of 9.6 km it was already 36.7.

In addition, on the counter, Kuklina took out two more doppron cartridges.

As a result, Mironova, although she received the fifth baton, was already more than a minute away from France and Belarus and 30 seconds away from Germany.

It was possible to get closer to the top three only thanks to perfect work on the lines.

However, shooting was never Svetlana's strong point.

In addition, the athlete began to give in quite a lot with her legs.

And four total misses increased the gap between Russia and the leader to two minutes.

In such a situation, Nigmatullina fled into battle, knowing full well that there was no longer any talk of fighting for medals.

And she herself did not please me with either the move or the shooting.

Ulyana made three mistakes and traditionally moved extremely slowly along the distance.

As a result, only eighth place, three minutes and 10.6 seconds behind the victorious French women.

Anais Bescon, Anais Chevalier, Julia Simon and Justine Breza worked almost perfectly on the firing lines, using only four additional rounds.

For comparison, the Swedes fled to two penalty loops.

Mona Brorsson scored with a minus sign.

But this did not stop the Scandinavians from winning bronze.

But the Belarusian fans, who had a great start to the season, made the fans happy again.

To the successful results in individual races, they added a silver in the debut relay.

Shooting was also a strong point of the neighbors.

Irina Krivko, Dinara Alimbekova, Elena Kruchinkina and Anna Sola made only six penalties.

Moreover, in the first four lines, they worked perfectly and fought for victory, but after that they still began to misfire, although they avoided going into circles and held second place.

Latypov's offensive misfire

Unfortunately, failure awaited the Russians in the pursuit too.

The men, apparently, did not have time to recover after winning bronze in the relay the day before.

Although Eduard Latypov had an excellent opportunity to compete for awards.

In the sprint, he took an offensive fourth place, losing quite a bit to the French Emilien Jacquelin and Quentin Fillon Maillet and was ready to take revenge from them.

Up to the racks, the leader of the national team fought a real battle for victory.

Even though he could not compete on an equal footing with Jacquelin and Sebastian Samuelsson in speed, he worked perfectly on the shooting lines, while, for example, Fillon Maillet made four penalties while lying down, and the current World Cup winner Johannes Boe - three.

But Vetle Shosta Christiansen, another more reliable Norwegian in shooting, moved up to the group of leaders.

Alas, at the third stage Latypov did not close two targets at once and actually dropped out of the number of applicants for awards.

Moreover, the rivals gave him an excellent opportunity, also making misfires, but the Russian could not cope with his nerves.

At the final stage, Edward was already fighting exclusively for getting into the flower ceremony, but he made another mistake.

And on the last lap of the native of Grodno, in addition, his strength left, and he barely reached the finish line only 11th.

Alexander Loginov, who went to the start 13th with a minute lag behind Samuelsson, could well have shown a good result.

And accurate shooting on the first lying down completely moved him to the sixth position.

For the second, the world champion missed one target and dropped out of the top 10.

However, a real failure awaited him on the racks - four total misses and only 31st place (+ 2: 18.6).

The remaining three Russians settled in the end of the fourth dozen.

The only plus is that they all managed to score points in the World Cup.

Alexander Povarnitsyn took 37th place, Vasily Tomshin - 39th, and Said Karimulla Khalili - 40th.

This time, domestic athletes were unable to boast of either a good move or accurate shooting.

They had 22 penalties on five.

In general, many biathletes on Sunday could not cope with the strong wind.

The exception was Christiansen, who left only one target uncovered.

This allowed him not only to win, but also to come out on top in the overall KM standings, beating Samuelsson.

In turn, the fast Swede in the fight for the silver bypassed Jacquelin without any problems.

Also, attention was drawn to the successful performance of some biathletes, who rarely even score cup points.

For example, Finn Tero Seppälä sensationally closed the top five, and Italian Tommaso Dzhakomel played 18 positions and finished seventh.

But some of the favorites, on the contrary, failed.

Beau Jr. is eighth, Fillon Maillet is 16th, and Tarjei Beux is 28th.