The “heirs” of the USSR national team won the ski relay at the Olympics after a 42-year break

The quartet team of the Russian Olympic Committee won the 4 x 10 km relay at the Beijing Olympics.

Aleksey Chervotkin ran away from his pursuers at halfway through the fresh snow, which kept falling and falling. And he was good himself, and the skis worked well.

Alexander Bolshunov went to the second classical stage, having an advantage over the German and Italian skiers in 23-24 seconds, and over the Norwegians in 34. We must pay tribute to the 31-year-old Paul Golberg – he caught up with his rivals and overtook him, but at the end of the stage he still “blown away”, losing to Sasha for almost a minute – 59.5 seconds. At 0.2 from him was a Swede.

Further, the riders had to go through two stages of 10 km free running. It became alarming when in just 2 km the pursuers won back 6 seconds from our Denis Spitsov. Of course, it is easier to work in a group, and Sergey Ustyugov went to the last stage, having only 45 seconds of advantage over the great Johannes Klebo, who has already proved many times that he is not only a sprinter.

Nevertheless, for the first kilometer, Sergei managed to win 13 seconds from Johannes. However, then the Norwegian worked hard, accelerated sharply and by the end of the first third of the stage he was 42.5 seconds behind. By the 5.4 km mark, it became clear that Klebo had broken down – “Losenok” increased the lead, and the Frenchman caught up with the Scandinavian. Ustyugov began to congratulate another one and a half kilometers before the finish line, and he finished with the flag of the ROC. Klebo still won silver for Norway. Bronze medal – at the “tricolor”.

The last time the Soviet team won the Olympic ski relay “for ours” was in 1980 in Lake Placid.

Recall that on the eve of the “golden” in the relay was the women’s quartet.