Russians dig deep to grab cross-country relay win

The Russian Olympic Committee won the gold medal in the women's 4x5km relay at the National Cross-Country Skiing Centre on Saturday, bagging the team's second gold in the sport at Beijing 2022.

The Russian team took an early lead with Yulia Stupak pulling away from Sweden's Maja Dahlqvist. But on the next leg, ROC's Natalia Nepryaeva was caught by Germany's Katharina Hennig.

Over the next several kilometers, ROC and Germany traded the lead until Veronika Stepanova passed Sofie Krehl of Germany on the last lap of the last leg to win the gold in 53 min 41 sec.

"It is a special day. It was really tough because we have a win in the World Cup, and a lot of people know we can win, so they say, 'You must win, you must win'. So I am like,'OK, we need a good result', and I do what I can do," said Stepanova after anchoring the ROC victory.

At 21 years and 39 days, she became the second-youngest medalist in the women's relay, after Hilkka Riihivuori of Finland (19 years, 49 days in 1972).

Stupak said at the post-race news conference that she felt motivated by the challenging course in Zhangjiakou.

"We tried to push the limit. We had big motivation and good concentration before the start. It was a hard race but it was a good race for us," she said.

"It (winning gold) was not a shock for us, for our team. We prepared for this race the whole year. It's a good result for everybody in our team. We were ready for this medal."

Germany took silver, 18.2 seconds behind the Russians, while Sweden edged Finland for bronze with a time of 54:02.7.

The four-person relay began as a mass-start with 18 racers. Each competitor skies two laps of a 2.5-km course. The first two skiers race in classic style and the last two in freestyle.

Norway's hopes suffered an early blow as Tiril Weng fell following a collision with Latvian rival Patricija Eiduka, but her team managed to battle its way back into contention before falling away again late on.

Therese Johaug, who has already won two gold medals at the Beijing Winter Games, briefly brought the chasing pack closer to the leaders, but she could not catch them. The defending champions finished fifth.

China crossed the line in 10th place with a time of 57:49.7. The host nation's four skiers－Chi Chunxue, Li Xin, Bayani Jialin and Ma Qinghua－achieved the team's best result in the history of the Winter Olympics.