The Saturday program of the Biathlon World Cup stage in Anterselva continued with the women's relay race - the last before the Olympic Games in Beijing.
The Russian team did not neglect the chance to rehearse this discipline once again and put up the strongest squad available at the moment.
The quartet included Valeria Vasnetsova, Irina Kazakevich and Ulyana Nigmatullina, who the day before were the only ones to represent the country in the individual race.
Kristina Reztsova also joined them.
But she did not get the finishing stage, but the second one, in order to avoid unnecessary pressure and too sharp a struggle before leaving for China.
Nigmatullina was entrusted to finish the race, and Vasnetsova to start.
When the girls arrived at the first shooting, a strong wind was blowing through the stadium.
Not everyone managed to cope with his impulses.
Swede Mona Brorsson and Belarusian Dinara Alimbekova shot cleanly and took the lead.
Czech Jessica Islova and Swiss Amy Baserga were also accurate, but were 15 seconds behind their rivals.
Vasnetsova started shooting with a miss and was eventually forced to use two extra cartridges, which was still quite a good result.
Most of the girls stayed longer at the shooting range, and the Norwegian Caroline Knotten even went to the penalty loop.
The Russian woman returned to the track ninth and started chasing Brorsson and Alimbekova - in the course of the second round she reduced the gap to 17 seconds and even took third place.
At the second line, the Swede and the Belarusian gave a chance to the pursuers, but Vasnetsova did not take advantage of it.
Again, she had to correct two misses and lose a few seconds on this, while the rivals were mostly flawless.
The Russian biathlete again dropped to ninth place, showing the worst shooting inside the top ten.
It was already difficult for her to make up the backlog in a move - Brorsson and Alimbekova turned on all their reserves in order not to let anyone else near them.
When passing the baton, the Russian team was sixth, 20 seconds behind the intermediate third place.
In terms of speed, Vasnetsova was fifth at her stage, which could be written into her asset.
Reztsova, following the example of her compatriot, immediately rushed into battle, not wanting to save energy before shooting.
She managed to get closer to the Swede Ingela Andersson, the Belarusian Irina Leshchenko and the Italian Dorothea Wierer.
But then it was necessary to fight not with rivals, but with the wind.
With the appearance of leaders at the shooting range, he intensified even more.
Of the leaders, only Leshchenko managed to cope with prone without additional cartridges, and the Belarusian alone led the race.
Reztsova made two misses, Wierer barely escaped the penalty loop, and Andersson still went for it.
At the same time, they corrected their mistakes in the calm, when the next group of athletes ran up, who were already calmly closing the targets on the first attempt.
As a result, Reztsova dropped to sixth place.
But at the same time, there was not a single biathlete in front of her who could compete with the Russian woman in speed.
Christina did not even make any special efforts to be in the top three.
On the rack, Reztsova was finally lucky - she herself missed only once, while the Belarusian went to the penalty loop.
The leader of the Russian team captured the vacated first place and, before the relay was passed, she was 25 seconds ahead of the Italian team, which traditionally does not enter its best athletes for the last two stages.
Other strong women's teams lost to the Russians even more.
Kazakevich did not have to tear the veins at a distance, but it was worth concentrating on shooting.
The day before, she made six misses in the individual race, including five on the rack.
Things were better with Kazakevich in the prone position, and she passed her first milestone in the relay with dignity, using only one extra cartridge.
She left for the track with a half-minute advantage over her pursuers, and returned to the shooting range with a lead of 40 seconds.
But the problems with standing shooting at Kazakevich have not gone away. Even with extra rounds, she hit only two targets and went on three penalties. Fortunately, this did not lead to irreparable consequences for the Russian team. Still, other girls were wrong, and Kazakevich ran relatively well, and she had a backlog. She dropped to fifth place, but lost 24 seconds to the leader, and only seven seconds to the third position. On the last lap, Kazakevich fell behind a little, but the fight for the medals was not yet lost.
At the final stage, Nigmatullina did not immediately give chase.
She immediately abandoned the idea to get the Norwegian Ingrid Tandrevold and the Czech Lucia Harvatova and tried to keep up with the Italian Federica Sanfilippo.
The Russian woman wanted to win back by shooting, and she did it.
She was the first in the team to immediately hit all the targets, and very quickly, and was able to be close not only to Sanfilippo, but also to the Frenchwoman Anais Bescond.
Nigmatullina ran the next two kilometers worse than her rivals and let them go again.
At the same time, an unexpected gift was presented to the competitors by Kharvatova, who fell on the descent.
She not only lost half a minute at once and allowed Tandrevold to celebrate the victory ahead of schedule, but also allowed Nigmatullina, Sanfilippo and Bescon to her.
Kharvatova arrived at the shooting range earlier than the trio, but she had to blow through the sight for a long time before she could start shooting.
Other girls began to share medals among themselves.
The Russian and the French with one miss returned to the track earlier than the Italian, who had two misfires.
The Norwegians secured the gold, which was their first relay medal of the season.
On the last lap, Nigmatullina was rather anxious, because at her stage she did not show phenomenal speed.
But it soon became clear that the Russian woman was simply misleading her rivals.
She managed to break away from Bescon before the finish line and avoid the attacks of Sanfilippo.
The Russian team won silver with three penalties and for the third time in a row climbed the podium in the relay race.