Dorothea Wierer on the podium, Lisa Vittozzi almost

Another solid performance by Lisa Vittozzi in the second sprint held on the Swedish Idre track in preparation for the World Cup that will start at the end of the month in Oestersund. The Carabiniere from Sappada, who was fourth on Saturday, repeated with the same placing in a windy race won by Sweden’s Elvira Oeberg over Germany’s Janina Hettich-Walz and her sister Hanna Oeberg, who lost two places from the previous day. Vittozzi curiously made her only shooting error of the day in the downhill series, exactly as she had done on Saturday, missing the podium by just 1″, but she gave the feeling that her form was growing on skis. In the men’s sprint, a German hat trick with Lucas Fratzscher ahead of David Zobel and Johannes Kuehn, 36th place for Lukas Hofer.

In contrast, a mass start was held in Geilo (Nor) that featured a good performance by Patrick Braunhofer. The South Tyrolean Carabiniere took second place in the men’s race, which saw the clear domination of host Martin Nevland, who finished in 39’11″7 with two errors. Braunhofer charged 47″2 with three errors, and in third place was Poland’s Marcin Zawol at 49″7 with no errors, the only af among the starters to finish with a 0. Two other Azzurri were present at the start: Elia Zeni, who placed 20th at 2’50″8 with 6 errors, while Daniele Cappellari finished 36th at 4’00″3 with 3 errors.

The Italian team was also present at the start.

An Italian podium also came in the women’s mass start, where Dorothea Wierer placed third, beaten by Ingrid Landmark Tandrevold who, with two errors, posted a time of 35’51″4 ahead of compatriot Ragnhild Femsteinevik, who was 15″3 behind but without errors. The South Tyrolean finisher, on the other hand, turned in penalties three times, but showed excellent condition on the narrow skis, coming to stake her victory in the last polygon. Surprisingly fourth was Norwegian-born Danish Anne De Besche, and fifth was Belgium’s Lotte Lie. “I think it went quite well,” Wierer commented at the finish line on Norwegian television, “We held the meet here and so we didn’t prepare these races very well, but I’m quite satisfied with what I did. Of course the shot was not perfect, I had some back problems in the past few days and I hope to solve them in time for the World Cup.”