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Beaudry blossoms in World Cup relay

Sarah Beaudry has nailed down a place in Canada's biathlon history book.
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Sarah Beaudry of Prince George, left, poses with Canadian biathlon teammate Megan Tandy, also of Prince George, sporting a cast on her left arm after a fall in training for the BWM IBU World Cup races in Canmore. Beaudry helped the mixed relay team to a sixth-place finish Sunday, tying the all-time best result for Canada.

Sarah Beaudry has nailed down a place in Canada's biathlon history book.

With the weight of a country on her shoulders and her Canadian teammates counting on her to hold up to the pressure of racing on home soil with the best in the world, Beaudry did not wilt. The 21-year-old from Prince George helped Canada finish sixth out of 22 teams Sunday at the BMW IBU World Cup mixed relay at Canmore Nordic Centre.

Beaudry, Rosanna Crawford of Canmore, Macx Davies of Canmore and Brendan Green of Hay River, N.W.T., combined to tie Canada's best-ever finish in a Word Cup mixed relay, set in 2012. It came two days after Beaudry finished a personal-best 38th in the sprint race.

"It was super-fun to race, the crowds were very loud and vocal and we all pulled together for a solid race," said Beaudry. "Everyone performed well in the last race in Canmore."

Germany (Franziska Hildebrand, Franziska Preuss, Arnd Peiffer and Simon Schempp) led from start to finish and won gold in one hour five minutes 38.8 seconds, 1:12.9 ahead of second-place Italy, and 1:23.8 in front of the bronze medalists from Norway.

Canada finished 1:34.3 off the winning pace, just 11.5 seconds out of bronze-medal position.

Beaudry was tagged by Canadian team veteran Crawford to begin the second leg of the relay, a six-kilometre race for the women. At that time, Canada was sixth, 32.1 seconds behind the leaders from Germany.

"(American Hannah Dreissigacker) got tagged off just ahead of my and I knew her from IBU Cup so I tried to stay with her on the first lap without going too crazy and I came into the range and checked the wind and just went for it," said Beaudry.

Beaudry shot clean in her prone bout and used just one spare bullet in the standing round, and had Canada up to fifth place by the 4.8 km marker. When she tagged Davies to begin the men's 7.5 km race, Canada was sixth, just behind Italy.

"I came in to my standing and missed one but hit my spare quickly, so I was happy with that," said Beaudry. "I was tired but tried to give everything I could on the last loop and then watched excitedly while Macx and Brendan had awesome races too."

Canada used just six spare rifle rounds the entire race. Davies had three misses, Crawford missed two. Beaudry hit nine out of 10 targets, while Green shot clean in both rounds. Each biathlete carries a magazine which contains five rounds. They also have three individual rounds, which must be loaded one at a time if they miss.

Green's flawless standing round moved Canada into fourth, with a medal still a possibility, but he got passed on the course by the USA and France, who finished fourth and fifth respectively.

The four Canadians each earned money for their top-six finish -- Beaudry's second career biathlon payday. She also collected a cheque for a sixth-place IBU Cup finish in an individual race last season.

"I'm super-stoked to get PBs in both races and to do it at home when everyone was here will be something I'll remember for my entire career," said Beaudry, whose parents Leisbet and Pierre and brother Sylvain were in the crowd. "You never known when there will be another home World Cup and it was exciting to be part of it."

National team coaches Matthias Ahrens and Roddy Ward were elated with Sunday's relay result.

"It was a fantastic day for the team," said former Prince George resident Eric de Nys, now four months into his new job as Biathlon Canada's high performance director.

"With Sarah being one of our young guns and Macx having just turned 23, they handled the pressure fantastically. It's really encouraging to see the home roots performing well on the world stage. We have some of the younger Prince George athletes like Emily Dickson (in Canmore) and it shows them what's possible."

Beaudry will remain in Canmore until Feb. 22, when she travels to a national team training camp in Voss, Norway to prepare for the world championships which start the following week in Oslo.

Beaudry is one of two Caledonia Nordic Ski Club members on the Canadian women's team. Megan Tandy, 27, was scheduled to race Friday's sprint but broke her wrist in a training run on Tuesday.

In other weekend results, Nathan Smith of Calgary was 16th in Saturday's 15 km men's mass start trace.