Easy to climb

The Russians took silver in the relay

The first stage of the World Cup in cross-country skiing ended in Beitoshtolen, Norway, instilling confidence in the Russians. Its result was “silver” for the domestic relay quartet consisting of Maxim Vylegzhanin, Nikolai Pankratov, Alexander Legkov and Ilya Chernousov. Our three other fours - two women's and one men's - finished the race in the top eight teams.

The men's relay started on Sunday after the women's, where Russian Natalya Korosteleva was 20 seconds short of reaching the podium with her compatriots. Irina Artemyeva, who changed her last name to Khazova, Alena Sidko, Evgeniya Dementyeva and Korosteleva completed the race in four. And Olga Zavyalova, Olga Rocheva, Natalya Ilyina and Diana Sapronova became sixth. All participants in the women's relay, and 20 teams took the start, spoke about the difficult weather conditions. Remembering the past seasons, no one could complain about the lack of snow in Beitoshtolen, however, the day before the relay races there was light rain, which threatened to turn the ski track into a real mess.

However, after two hours, the men had to face much more serious problems than the weaker half of the participants. The snow was falling like a wall, making visibility on the highway difficult. In such a difficult situation there was no time left to shake things up. It was necessary to break right off the bat. Russian Egor Sorin quickly realized what was happening, grabbed the Norwegian Eldar Rening and stayed second for most of the distance.

After the five-kilometer cutoff, both Sorin and Vylegzhanin, representing the Russia-1 quartet, were at the beginning of the peloton, taking fifth or sixth places. And at the end of the stage, Vylegzhanin took the lead, passing the baton to Pankratov first, with an advantage of almost 5 seconds over the Norwegians. Sorin was unable to maintain the set pace and finished 12th in the segment.

However, the density of the results was such that the picture could change at any second, which was proved by Vasily Rochev, who took over the baton from Sorin. For about half the distance in the second stage, Pankratov dragged the peloton behind him. Then Rochev took on the role of leader. And again, a few meters before the finish, two Norwegians took the lead. Rochev finished his stage third, Pankratov sixth.

However, soon Sergei Shiryaev, who started for the Russia-2 team, corrected the situation. And for the second Russian, Alexander Legkov, it was not difficult to win back the six seconds lost by Pankratov. On one of the climbs, Legkov technically overtook the Norwegian leader and moved to first position. His breakthrough was also taken up by the German Rene Sommerfeld. Apparently, the coaches of the German team, having analyzed the Russian squad, assumed a similar scenario. By the way, the fact that Legkov ran not the fourth, but the penultimate stage, played a positive role. Firstly, Legkov is one of those who can make the groundwork for the finisher. Secondly, he avoided an unnecessary psychological duel with his principled rival, the Norwegian Peter Northug. It was Legkov who actually ensured that the Russian team got into the prizes. He passed the baton to Ilya Chernousov first, Sommerfeld finished behind him with a minimal gap, the Norwegians were third with a difference of 10 seconds.

Few doubted that the owner of the track, Northug, would easily win back this gap. But Chernousov also made every effort to stay behind. Having bypassed the German Tobias Angerer, the Norwegian considered the matter decided, but Chernousov was not going to give up and got ahead of him. However, once again, demonstrating his signature dash, Northug led the Norwegians to victory. Chernousov is second, the German quartet rounded out the top three. The second Russian four (Sorin, Rochev, Shiryaev, Alexander Kuznetsov) finished the relay eighth.

Olga ERMOLINA