In what was the third World Cup meeting of the season after legs in Ruka and Lillehammer, Nilsson made it five sprint wins from six World Cup races, having won four in a row, across both free and classic disciplines, before finishing fifth last week in the Norwegian resort.

She finished ahead of Norway's Maiken Caspersen Falla, in second, with Kikkan Randall, of the United States, in third.

The closest of sprint finishes saw Nilsson pip Caspersen Falla by just 0.08 seconds and she now leads the World Cup sprint standings by 15 points ahead of her rival.   

This was Randall's first World Cup podium, not including last season's World Championships sprint bronze, since having her first child in April 2016. 

In fact this was Randall's first World Cup podium since Lahti in 2015.  

Norway's Johannes Høsflot Klæbo sprinted to his sixth straight victory over all disciplines in the men's event.

He was always going to be tough to stop and so it proved with the 21-year-old finishing ahead of Federico Pellegrino, of Italy, with Alexander Bolshunov, of Russia, coming home in third.

Klaebo had already won the first two men's sprint World Cup events of this season, the sprint classic in Lillehammer on December 2 and the sprint classic in Ruka (3-Days Tour) on November 24.

This victory meant Klaebo has tied his countrymen Petter Northug Jr and Martin Johnsrud Sundby as the only men to win six World Cups in one season before the New Year.  

He will sit out tomorrow's 15 kilometre interval start competition in the free technique and will still have five races left before the end of the year to set the record for the most wins during this period. 

Pellegrino finished 1.8 seconds bac, with Bolshunov a further 4.64 seconds in arrears.  

Those three make up the top three in the Overall Sprint standings with Bolshunov ahead of Pellegrino.