Norway cruises to men's, women's World Cup cross-country relay gold
Canadian men 9th, women finish 12th
Norway proved unbeatable on Sunday, winning both the men's and women's cross-country World Cup relay races.
Astrid Uhrenholdt Jacobsen anchored the dominant Norway team to a comfortable victory in the women's relay.
The team also included Ingvild Flugstad Oestberg, Heidi Weng and Therese Johaug.
Oestberg pulled away from the rest of the field in the first leg to give the Norwegians a lead of close to half a minute to win the 4x5-kilometer race in 50 minutes, 17.2 seconds.
"It's really nice to win with the team," said Johaug.
The American team of Sophie Caldwell, Sadie Bjornsen, Elizabeth Stephen and Jessica Diggins finished second, 42.1 seconds behind for the best result for the U.S. in the team competition after two third-place finishes in 2012 and 2015. Finland was third, 55.9 seconds back.
Canada's team of Emily Nishiskawa, Dahria Beatty, Cendrine Browne, and Maya MacIsaac-Jones finished 12th, with a combined time of 55:19.6 – 5:02.4 back of Sweden.
Martin Johnsrud Sundby, the leader of the individual overall World Cup standings, built a decisive lead in his second leg for the favored Norwegians to win the men's 4x7.5-kilometer competition in 1:08:29.
Sjur Roethe, Mathias Rundgreen and Finn Haagen Krogh also skied for Norway to beat the Russian team of Evgeniy Belov, Alexander Legkov, Alexey Chervotkin and Sergey Ustiugov by 6.0 seconds
Italy finished third, 54.3 seconds back.
The Canadian men – Graeme Killick, Devon Kershaw, Len Valjas, and Knute Johnsgaard – were ninth, trailing the Norwegians by 1:15.1.