The Alfa-Bank Russian Summer Biathlon Championships ended with the women’s relay in Krasnoyarsk. The last gold of the tournament was taken by the Moscow region team, ahead of its main rivals from the Sverdlovsk region. But the most surprising thing was the performance of the finalist from the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug-Yugra team, junior Victoria Meteli, who in a tough battle for bronze outplayed the more experienced player from Tyumen, Victoria Slivko.
Good start for the leaders
The main favourite before the start of the relay was the Sverdlovsk region, which included Tamara Derbusheva, Irina Kazakevich, Anastasia and Natalia Shevchenko. And the main competitor was seen as the team from the Moscow region, which had seriously strengthened in the off-season: Polina Shevnina and Anastasia Khalili were joined by Anastasia Zyryanova and Kristina Reztsova. It turned out to be simply a stellar cast.
The race did not start very well for the favourites. After the first stage, the biathletes from the Moscow region were only third, 24.8 seconds behind the leader from the Republic of Bashkortostan. The team from Sverdlovsk was fourth (+35.3) and the team from Tyumen eighth (+1.22.38).
The male leaders failed sensationally in the relay race
Sensational results of the men’s relay at the 2024 Biathlon Championships. Failure of the leaders
But in the second stage, Polina Shevnina performed a real miracle. The athlete systematically approached the leaders and after a prone position with zero, she reduced the gap to 3.8 seconds. Shevnina did not run away from her rivals, but decided to walk at a leisurely pace. This helped her in qualifying: zero and first place with a difference of 26.8 seconds. When the baton was handed over to her, her advantage was just over 30 seconds.
Irina Kazakevich also made a breakthrough in the second stage. The skater from Sverdlovsk passed the lying stage without any problems, getting very close to Shevnina, but in the standing stage she did not do a great job: three mistakes and a minute behind even without penalty loops. But on the last lap, Kazakevich turned on the turbo and gained almost 30 seconds, reaching second position!
Tyumen also kept fighting. Elizaveta Frolova managed to lead the team from eighth to third place, making only one mistake at two milestones.
Favorites confirmed their status
The third stage near the Moscow region was completed by Kristina Reztsova. The athlete broke away from her rivals by a couple of seconds, but did not increase the pace too much. This helped Kristina to pass the upside-down stage with only one mistake, but a surprise occurred on the standing stage: Reztsova entered the circle, fired all the extra cartridges at one target and failed to close it.
Surprisingly, even this did not prevent her team from staying in the lead. Reztsova came out first from the line with a lead of 36.3 seconds. Shevchenko’s mistakes played into Kristina’s hands. Anastasia kept pace with the leader and went through the stage upside down at zero, but in the standing stage she almost went into a circle, using three special stages. The first to change the stage were the biathletes from the Moscow region, and the biathletes from Sverdlovsk came in second (+34.1).
But the Tyumen region is in trouble. The stage was led by former skier Anna Grukhvina. On the bench the athlete performed perfectly, but on the podium she broke down when she entered the circle. This left Tyumen in fifth place with a gap of one and a half minutes.
The fourth stage could have been decisive if not for the decent gap between the leaders. Anastasia Khalili, who was in very good form in Krasnoyarsk, rode for the team on the last stage. After the first milestone, the Moscow region’s lead increased to 58.8 seconds. No matter how hard Natalia Shevchenko tried, who had fallen unpleasantly in the penalty loop the day before, she could not get closer.
Shevchenko had her entire leg skinned during a fall the day before
Slivko didn’t want to race, but she won the sprint at the 2024 World Championships. And Shevchenko fell
In the last position, Khalili missed twice and Shevchenko got it right, but Anastasia still had a 42-second lead. She walked the last lap at a leisurely pace, so the winners and silver medalists were separated by 34.6 seconds.
Suddenly, the fight for third place broke out. At the final stage, Victoria Slivko from Tyumen and Victoria Metelya from Ugra managed to join the top three: the young athlete pulled her team out of sixth place. On the stage, the experienced Slivko made a mistake and fiddled with the extra for a long time, and the young Metelya, although she made a mistake, worked quickly. As a result, they left the line at the same time.
Slivko and Metelya fought to the finish line, and the woman from Ugra was already stronger at the finish line. Thanks to 21-year-old Victoria, the KhMAO-Ugra team, in which Ekaterina Sukhanova, Vladislava Gavrilova and Ekaterina Moshkova also competed, climbed onto the podium.
We say goodbye to biathlon until November. At the end of autumn, the first stage of the Russian Cup will start in Khanty-Mansiysk.
