The final race of the Russian Championship of this season took place in Uvat - a women's 30-kilometer marathon with eight firing lines. Only 19 biathletes took part in it, and only 17 even reached the finish line. Unlike the men’s race the day before, where Roman Surnev attempted to break away from the very first kilometers, here the athletes completed the starting laps in a fairly compact group. Seven biathletes reached the first shooting range within ten seconds.
The winner of the “Big Crystal Globe” in the Russian Cup, Natalia Shevchenko, immediately made three misfires and eliminated herself from the list of contenders for medals, although she later made a leap from 15th to fifth place. And Victoria Slivko closed the starting targets the fastest. Elizaveta Kaplina was only slightly behind her, and Anastasia Egorova also entered the top three. Irina Kazakevich, although she made one mistake, quickly overtook and overtook the Murmansk woman, and after the second shooting range she went into the distance first with a decent advantage.
At the same time, Anastasia Goreeva pulled herself up to the lead group, but Kaplina missed three targets and rolled far behind the leaders, losing almost a minute to Irina. Looking ahead, we note that Elizaveta finished the race in eighth place with ten penalties.
Egorov was let down by her skiing in the first half of the distance (with an equal number of misses with Kazakevich, she was 51 seconds behind her), and in the second - by shooting. In four entries into the stadium, she added ten misfires to the two she already had and ended up losing almost five minutes to the winner at the finish line.
And the climax of the race came at the fifth firing line. Goreeva missed four times and gave Slivko and Kazakevich the opportunity to fight each other for gold. The girls walked the next lap side by side and simultaneously appeared at the shooting range. Irina worked quickly, but inaccurately - she made two misfires, and Victoria slowly closed all the targets and created a reserve for herself in 24 seconds. At the sixth turn, Kazakevich was forced to overcome another penalty loop, and her opponent’s advantage grew to 45 seconds.
At the penultimate shooting stage, both athletes made one mistake, but the final stand tightened the intrigue to the limit. Slivko unexpectedly allowed herself two misfires at once, and Kazakevich shot with such amazing speed and accuracy that she reduced the gap to just 9.6 seconds. But Irina failed to make a sensation on the last lap - fatigue and the difficult track took its toll. Although, as the winner admitted after the race, she was confident that her opponent would effortlessly win back this gap.
“Nine seconds for Irina is nothing. I saw how well she walked the distance after prone. I was in the lead for more than half the race. And it was already hard for me too: my boots were squelching, my skis weren’t moving. A very difficult race, it was more difficult for me than last year. It seems like last year the weather was worse, but it was easier. Maybe we are more tired this year, because the Russian championship was so intense, very emotional, our races were interesting,” Slivko shared on Match TV.
After the finish, Kazakevich also admitted that when leaving the stadium, she believed in her ability to overtake her opponent. However, on the final climb it became clear: Victoria could no longer be caught.
“I dedicate the silver to my coach Mikhail Shashilov, he recently had a birthday. I hope that one day I will be able to dedicate a gold medal to him,” Irina noted.
The fight for bronze did not work out at all. Egorova, as mentioned above, could not cope with the shooting, and Polina Shevnina, although she made few mistakes, lost greatly with Goreeva’s move. As a result, Anastasia covered most of the distance alone and finished third. She was pleased with the medal she won, but criticized herself for her work on the firing lines.
“With such a shameful shooting, I’m third... This probably happened because the snow is soft and the carpets are uneven. I am grateful to Polina Shevnina for not trying to catch up with me; I no longer had the strength to run the finishing lap. Third place is a worthy result, it was my first time running such a distance,” Goreeva shared.
It is worth noting the anti-records of the race. Former skier Anna Grukhvina made the most mistakes: she missed 13 targets and took penultimate place. And in last place was one of the most accurate, but at the same time slowest biathletes of the race - Zhanna Maksimovich. With two misses, she lost to Slivko for more than 12 minutes. Tamara Derbusheva also failed to cope with the difficult route. She missed only once on the range, but finished only tenth, six minutes behind.