Domracheva found herself in 19th place in the standings after a penalty on the first prone stage of the race in Italy.

It proved to be her only penalty of the event as she achieved three straight clean shooting stages to rise up the standings.

It helped her rise to first place aftersuccessfully chasing down Slovakia’s Anastasiya Kuzmina, the leader from the opening loop of the circuit.

Domracheva overtook the Slovakian at the final shooting section, before crossing the line as the winner in a time of 40min 23.9sec.

She finished 11.9 seconds clear of Kuzmina, who finished the race with three penalties to her name.

The podium was rounded off by Kaisa Makarainen, with the fast finishing Finn ending 16.2 seconds off the winner’s pace after accruing four penalties.

"It is always nice to be on the podium, especially in first place," Domracheva, a triple gold medallist at Sochi 2014, said.

"It was very tough race and very slow track conditions.

"From the beginning of the race, it was very important to be focused on shooting.

"I was not worried about the other athletes; I had to just do my job."

France’s Martin Fourcade triumphed in the men’s 15km mass start competition, narrowly holding off the challenge of Norway’s Tarjei Bø

The two men received two penalties during the competition but Fourcade emerged as the winner of the battle by closing the line in 40:18.6.

Bø ended 2.8 seconds behind the double Sochi 2014 gold medallist.

Fellow Norwegian Erlend Bjøntegaard rounding off the top three a further 2.3 seconds down.