After half of the race the biathletes from Norway and France were in the lead and after the exchange Tarjei Bø extended his small lead as expected. After his standing shooting he wasn't that strong in skiing than before and in yesterday's sprint, so that Germany and Austria were able to catch up by good cooperation of Peiffer and Landertinger during the lap before the last exchange. In the prone shooting of the final skier then Benni Doll tried to put pressure on his opponents. But only Johannes Thingnes Bø kept his nerve and hit all five targets in his first try, so he went with a slight lead on the second lap and increased the pace. In the standing shooting, then turned the tide and the Norwegian lost his lead after three spare rounds, while the German needed only one additional shot. Together they went into the last lap and Bø attacked in the first climb after the stadium. Doll did not even try to follow the Norwegian, because he was sure to have no chances at such an early attack and rather saved energies for the mass start. So both celebrated early their first and second place. In third place, there has been an exciting battle between Austria and France since their prone shooting, which the Frenchman finally won in the final sprint. After a strong performance of their anchor skier, Matvey Eliseev (RUS), Evgeniy Garanichev (RUS, Fischer skis and bindings), Dmitry Malyshko and Alexander Loginov (both RUS, Fischer skis, bindings and boots) secured fifth place ahead of Sweden, who shortly before the start had to replace their final skier Sebastian Samuelsson (SWE) by Peppe Femling (SWE, Fischer skis and bindings).
