CROSS-COUNTRY SKI. Rybinsk hosted last weekend the first official FIS competition in Russia of the winter 2011-2012. Russia's best sprint specialist competed in sprint classic and fee. 

Victoria Melina, sprint classic

Rybinsk is a well known organizer of top level competitions as the World Cup circuit has stopped here every winter. On Saturday and Sunday Russian sprinters gathered in Demino to compete in the sprint competitions.

Korosteleva and Petukhov win on Saturday

Natalia Korosteleva and Alexei Petukhov celebrated wins in Saturday’s free technique sprint. Korosteleva already dominated the qualifier with the fastest time. Korosteleva was superior all the way through to the finals where she edged out Viktoria Melina, Natalya Zernovs and Belarusian Valentina Kaminskaya.

Natalia Korosteleva and Alexei Petukhov

Alexei Petukhov got through from the qualification with third quickest time. Petukhov confirmed to be strong free technique sprint specialist and clearly took victory in the finals. Andrey Parfenov finished second and Stanislav Bogdanov third.

Melina and Kriukov shine on Sunday

Russian sprinters could take the opportunity to revenge on Sunday, when sprint classic took place on the same course as on Saturday. Victoria Melina was superior and beat both Daria Godovanichenko and Saturday’s winner Natalia Korosteleva on third place.

Nikita Kriukov

Olympic sprint champion Nikita Kriukov secured victory on the men’s side ahead of Alexander Panzhinskiy and Igor Usachev.

FIScrosscountry.com
Monday 31 October 2011

The winners

foto © Федерация Лыжных Гонок России www.flgr.ru