Sweden overcome foggy competitions to win Oberhof men's relay
BySportsbeat
Updated 07/01/2018 at 21:14 GMT
Sweden moved up to second in the World Cup standings after victory in the Oberhof men's relay as leaders Norway could only manage third.
(L-R) Jesper Nelin, Fredrik Lindstroem, Martin Ponsiluoma and Sebastian Samuelsson of team Sweden celebrates after winning the men's 4 x 7,5 km relay event of the IBU Biathlon World Cup in Oberhof, eastern Germany, on January 7, 2018. Team Sweden won the
Image credit: Getty Images
The Swedish quartet of Martin Ponsiluoma, Jesper Nelin, Sebastian Samuelsson and Fredrik Lindstroem won in foggy conditions that made for tricky shooting, with Italy coming home second.
And it was their accuracy with the gun that was the basis of their victory, with just ten faults to second-placed Italy's 13 and the Norwegians' 17.
The Swedes comfortably raced to victory in a time of 1:19:44.1, more than a minute ahead of Italy with Norway coming home more than two minutes back.
Russia led into the first exchange following a strong opening leg from Alexey Volkov, before Belgium impressed in the second stage to lead by 0.6s at the half way stage.
It was Samuelsson's clean third round – with one spare – that put the Swedes into second place at the final changeover.
And Lindstroem then went clean over both prone and standing to race into the lead as Thierry Chenal picked up a penalty in the final leg to drop Italy into second.
The win leaves Sweden second in the World Cup standings, just five points behind Norway who lead on 108.
Italy sit third on 94, with Germany and France just two and six points further back, respectively.
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