Beranová was three hundredths of a second away from the sprint final in Ruka, taking a lifetime 7th place

The 24-year-old Beranová had a clear strategy on the 1.4-kilometer circuit. At the beginning, she stayed more at the back and attacked on the final hill on the approach to the finish line. In the quarterfinals, she absolutely dominated when she moved to the front and won by a large margin. Antošová finished fourth in the same heat.

In the semi-finals, Beranová pushed her way up the hill to second place behind Sweden’s Johanna Hagströmová. In the last tens of meters, the Norwegian Kristine Stavaas Skistadová showed greater acceleration, and at the finish line she got the toe of her shoe ahead of the Czech representative.

Despite this, Beranová improved by two places her individual best in the WC from February 2021, when she made it into the elite ten in the free sprint in Ulricehamn, Sweden, with seventh place. In the classic technique sprint, before today’s race, her best result was the twentieth place from last year’s Ruka.

Then the Swedish Maja Dahlqvist won, who was also in the final this time. She led after the final climb, but fell in the last corner before the finish and finished sixth with a big loss. Thanks to this, her compatriot Ribomová was happy about her first triumph in the WC.

Both Novák and Černý were close to advancing in their quarter-final heats. Both were moving at the front, but on the last climb they dropped to third place and never got out of it. Černý missed the second place in the promotion by thirteen hundredths, Novák lost to it by three hundredths more. Neither of them had enough time among the lucky losers.

The race from the qualification, in which Luděk Šeller was eliminated, was dominated by the defender of the overall victory in the World Cup Klaebo. He easily won all the elimination rounds. In the final, he gave the runner-up Even Northug 1.66 seconds. In the absence of the punished Russians, the Norwegians took the first four places. Paal Golberg and Erik Valnes finished behind Klaeb and Northug.

On Saturday, the first long-distance races of the season await the cross-country skiers. Men and women will ride in Ruka 10 kilometers classically with an interval start.