France Wins Gold Medal for Biathlon Olympics 2018 Mixed Relay

France grabbed gold in the mixed biathlon relay at the 2018 Winter Olympics on Tuesday, ahead of Norway and Italy.

Marie Dorin Habert, Anais Bescond, Simon Desthieux and Martin Fourcade set a time of one hour, eight minutes and 34.3 seconds, having missed a total of just four shots.

World champions Germany missed out on a medal despite holding a 32.6-second lead at the top of the standings at the final changeover.

Here are the times:

France (Marie Dorin Habert, Anais Bescond, Simon Desthieux, Martin Fourcade)—1:08:34.3

Norway (Marte Olsbu, Tiril Eckhoff, Johannes Thingnes Bo, Emil Hegle Svendsen)—1:08:55.2

Italy (Lisa Vittozzi, Dorothea Wierer, Lukas Hofer, Dominik Windisch)—1:09:01.2

Here is the live medal table:

Lisa Vittozzi kicked off proceedings for Italy, and her shooting was not only flawless but supremely quick as she took little more than 20 seconds for each shoot.

As a result, Italy held a lead of 2.2 seconds ahead of Germany at the first changeover, with Vanessa Hinz also hitting all 10 of her targets.

Dorothea Wierer lost 23.3 seconds to Laura Dahlmeier with her second shoot, though, as she missed three targets at the first attempt compared with the German's one, per IBU World Cup:

Germany were 29.9 seconds up on Italy at the second exchange, where Erik Lesser set about trying to increase that time.

Despite having to use a spare round in his standing shoot, he gained a further 3.7 seconds.

Behind Germany, superb third legs from France's Desthieux and Norway's Johannes Thingnes Bo catapulted both countries ahead of Italy into the medal positions.

Individual gold medallist Bo's effort was particularly impressive, with Norway having been over 1:23 behind when he entered the fray.

It was France who went first, though, when two disastrous shoots from Arnd Peiffer saw Germany slip from first to fourth and allowed Fourcade to open up some breathing room at the head of the race.

Norway, despite 12 penalties, powered home to second, while Windisch overcame Peiffer in a final sprint finish to seal bronze.