Failure on the lines: six misses left Reztsova without a medal in the pursuit at the KM stage in Oberhof

More than successful for the Russian national team, the World Cup stage in Oberhof ended with two pursuits.

After the victory of Anton Babikov and Kristina Reztsova in the super mix, the fans were counting on medals in the individual races.

Unfortunately, the men failed to please.

Sprint triumphant Alexander Loginov had all the chances to take first place again, but three misses in the last standing pushed him to fifth place.

All hope remained with women.

However, perhaps only one Russian woman, Reztsova, had a chance to compete for the awards.

In the sprint, only two misses at the second stage prevented her from climbing into the top three.

But in the pursuit race, she had to leave with a minimum lag behind her rivals and, given her speed, she could quickly catch up to them.

Kristina's chances were also increased by the removal of the Belarusian Anna Sola.

The rest had to get out of the depths. Valeria Vasnetsova started the race 24th, Irina Kazakevich - 30th, Svetlana Mironova - 33rd. All of them were almost a minute and a half behind the leader Martha Reyseland. And Ulyana Nigmatullina and Anastasia Shevchenko did not qualify for the pursuit.

As expected, Reztsova started the race right off the bat and immediately began to improve her position, playing one position after another. At one of the first check marks, she was already going third, carrying a whole group of pursuers behind her. And most importantly, Christina worked perfectly on the bench and left the turn of the fourth, 42.3 seconds behind Røiseland. Hannah Oeberg and Marie Eder are in front with a minimal advantage. Behind - Stina Nilsson, Irina Leshchenko and Valentina Semerenko. But Elvira Eberg, who ranks second in the overall KM standings, not only missed, but also fell in the distance, rolling back into the middle of the second ten.

On the next couch, Reztsova did not have any problems again, unlike her rivals. Eberg Sr. and Eder did not close one target, which allowed the Russian woman to take second place. Reyseland was ahead in 25.8 seconds, which also made one mistake. Thus, the native of Moscow had a real opportunity to compete not only for awards, but also for victory.

Moreover, the Norwegian was not perfect on the counter.

Alas, Christina herself was in for a failure in this component.

If Loginov missed three times at the final stage, then she was already at the third.

The athlete was very unlucky.

She was caught in a gust and could not cope with the wind.

The pursuers who arrived at the border a little later worked in completely different conditions.

As a result, the Russian woman fell to the eighth position with almost a minute and a half behind the leader, and Eberg Sr., Belarusian Dinara Alimbekova and Julia Simon joined the battle for medals.

Meanwhile, nothing threatened Reyseland's advantage.

At the last stand it was important for her not to "shoot herself", and the Scandinavian coped with this task.

She won her third stage victory in Oberhof and strengthened her leadership in total.

Previously, Marthe finished first in the sprint and mixed relay.

Reztsova, who had the opportunity to compete for getting into the flower ceremony, missed three more times and fell back to 18th place.

The rest of the contenders for the prizes also made mistakes, but remained with their own.

Hannah Eberg won silver and Alimbekova - bronze.

The Belarusian managed to cope with the “curse of the fourth place”.

In five personal races in the current KM season, she occupied exactly this line, but on Sunday, finally, for the first time she was in the top three.

Reztsova managed to win back four positions on the last loop and ended up in 14th place.

Despite the failure of the racks, it again demonstrated excellent functional readiness.

Christina showed the second move, losing only to Justine Breza-Boucher.

But Vasnetsova became the best in the Russian national team that day, although the beginning of the pursuit turned out to be a failure for her.

On the first bench, she made two misses and rolled back to the end of the fourth decade.

But then Valeria worked almost perfectly, not covering only one target, and climbed to 11th place.

For her, this result is the best in her career in personal races within the World Cup.

The rest of the domestic biathletes performed worse.

Kazakevich made a leap upward, exchanging nine positions, and settled herself 21st.

At the same time, the athlete did not close four targets, three of which were on the stand.

The much more experienced Mironova became 27th with five misfires on the lines and more than three minutes behind the leader.

The only good news is the good speed of all Russian women.

Vasnetsova has 16th move, Kazakevich has 12th, and Mironova has 10th.