Germany’s Andrea Henkel took her first World Cup victory of the season in Oslo today, winning the 12.5 k mass start at Holmenkollen by almost 30 seconds over Darya Domracheva of Belarus.

Henkel had one penalty in the very first shooting stage, but shot clean after that and worked her way up through the field, taking the lead after the third shooting stage and never relinquishing it. It was the 21st World Cup victory for the 34-year-old German, who is also a World Championships and Olympic gold medalist. Henkel has said she will compete through the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia, but hadn’t had an excellent season so far.

“It is nice to win any time,” she said in a press conference today “It is good to be back on the top… It would be nice to be on the podium more often.”

Domracheva finished second despite four shooting penalties. Third went to a clean-shooting Teja Gregorin of Slovenia, who has been a strong presence in the overall World Cup rankings but had never actually finished on the podium until today.

The only North American to start, Zina Kocher of Canada, finished 29th with eight penalties.

Full results

Tags: Andrea Henkel, Holmenkollen, Oslo

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