As Tore said, Ustiugov had stomach problems and couldn't ski fast (per Markus Cramer, his coach). That's very unfortunate. The second major championship in a row that Ustiugov hasn't gotten anything out of, plus in 2014 he was part of that fall in the sprint final where Jonsson got a lucky bronze and in Falun he got sick the week before and wasn't at his best there. The medal today is really only down to the work his teammates did. Fortunate enough that Hyvarinen and Jouve decided to play cat and mouse on the final lap, because if they skied like a normal race, he may have been caught. First I hope that he get healthy. Probably shouldn't worry about the 50km, even if he's recovered. There are a number of Russians who only did one race so far and they will likely get their second and last shot on Sunday, guys like Belov, Maltsev, Melnichenko and Spitsov. Believe it or not, they are all capable of a medal if they are in good form, but who knows what form they are in now. Maybe one of those four, particularly the guys that have had stronger races in skate, Maltsev, Melnichenko and Spitsov could have skied in Ustiugov's place today. Hindsight is 20/20 and Ustiugov probably started getting sick this morning, and he didn't tell it to the coaches and obviously didn't want to Not start or drop out.
As far as the other three members, well, I think Bolshunov got on the best. He had good skis and skied well, making it a two man race and gave Ustiugov a much needed cushion to hold on to the silver, again, Finland and France playing the stupid game of cat and mouse helped a lot as well. Larkov said he wanted to go for it earlier but lost position on a descent and had to fight back just to get to the front. His skis were awful, it has to be said. Shades of the team sprint where both the men and women double poled what seemed like double the amount of the people around them. Bessmertnykh didn't have much better glide either, but whereas Larkov had good grip, Bessmertnykh had a tough time getting grip and skiing his normal, smooth diagonal stride and rhythm. The fact that he stuck with Niskanen and Sundby was impressive. They needed to try and gap the Norwegians in the first legs, but with those subpar skis, it was impossible. Iversen was the weakest link today, he struggled with grip as well, but unfortunately Russia and the other teams didn't take advantage of it.
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