Megan Heinicke was a hit on the World Cup biathlon range in Hochfilzen, Austria.
She finished without a miss in the third leg of the women's 4 X 6 km relay to help Canada place 11th out of 23 teams.
Heinicke, a 25-year-old from Prince George, was perfect on the range with 20 hits in 20 attempts over four shooting rounds and ended up the fastest finisher on the four-member Canadian team. Canada's time of one hour sixteen minutes 19.4 seconds was 3:10 off the winning pace of 1:13:09.2, set by Ukraine.
Rosanna Crawford of Canmore, Alta., was 19 seconds behind the leader when she tagged Megan Imrie of Falcon Lake, Man., and the team was 1:15.8 behind the leaders when Heinicke took over. The gap increased by only 7.2 seconds by the time Heinicke finished the third leg. Canada's anchor skier, ZIna Kocher of Red Deer, Alta., missed five targets and the five penalty loops, which dropped Canada out of the top 10.
In Sunday's 10 km pursuit, Crawford was the top Canadian in 32:48, 2:18 behind gold medalist Synnoeve Solendal of Norway (30:16). Imrie placed 45th (33:58) and Kocher was 57th (36:22). Heinicke, who finished 70th in Friday's sprint race, did not qualify.
Martin Fourcade of France won the men's 12.5 km pursuit in 32:43. Nathan Smith of Calgary was the top Canadian (27th in 34:33), followed by Jean Phillippe Le Guellec of Val-Blair, Que. (32nd in 34:51) and Brendan Green of Hay River, N.W.T. (35:41).
Canada finished ninth the men's 4 X 7.5 km relay Saturday. The team of Smith, Green Le Guellec and Scott Perras of Regina was 1:22 behind the gold medalists from Norway (1:19:50).
The World Cup scene switches this week to Annecy, France, starting with the women's relay on Thursday.
