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TIRIL ECKHOFF VICTORIOUS IN SPRINT IN NOVÉ MĚSTO NA MORAVĚ

The result was as everyone had predicted. Tiril Eckhoff, considered the front-runner by many, won the women’s sprint of the 8th round of World Cup in Nové Město na Moravě. The woman who won the same race at the World Championship in Pokljuka took the gold despite one missed target in prone position. The silver went to Julija Dzhima of the Ukraine, who made no mistake at the shooting range, and the bronze to Lisa Vittozzi of Italy. She too did not make a single mistake. Finishing twelfth, Markéta Davidová was the best among Czech women. She lost hopes for a better result with the very last shot.

Tiril Eckhoff did not start well into the sprint race. Having missed one target in prone position, she ran 22nd and was losing more than 20 second to the current leader of the race, Irene Cadurish of Switzerland. Her standing position shooting was flawless, though, and so the Norwegian started into the final lap on fourth place. She was very strong in the end of the race and took the victory with a gap of more than nine seconds.

“I spent a lot of time at the shooting range this time, but my goal was to strike as many targets as possible. This strategy worked out for me, and I did particularly well in the standing position. That meant that I could put all energy I had into the finish,” the winning lady commented.

Julija Dzhima proved not only amazing accuracy and speed of her shooting, but was also very fast on skis. Finishing second, she repeated her best result of this year’s season: her silver in Anterselva. The bronze medallist, Lisa Vittozzi, returned on the podium after a year: it had been in Kontiolahti in March 2020 that she had taken the bronze.

Czech ladies did much better in sprint race than they had in the relays when they finished 18th; Markéta Davidová finished 12th, mainly due to the unlucky last shot that missed the target. “My coach from when I was a junior, Mr Šikola, would say that only nitwits miss the last shot. …Well, I am a nitwit then,” Markéta evaluated her performance rather self-critically.

Lucie Charvátová achieved her best individual result in this year’s season, finishing 17th with 2 misses. She aced especially in running time, managing to get the fourth fastest time of all racers. Jessica Jislová made a good result too, getting 14 points for finishing 27th. Eva Puskarčíková qualified to the pursuit race thanks to her 49th place.