Their quartet of Ekaterina Yurlova-Percht, Margarita Vasileva, Nikita Porshnev and Yury Shopin ended with five spares en-route to victory on the Czech course, as well as showing fine speed on the roller-skis.

They stopped the watches at 1 hour 17min 10.6sec.

The victory was won on the final leg as Shopin shot clean in the prone position and powered away to the line.

Five teams had remained within 13 seconds of each other at the first handover. 

"I'm really happy that during the relay we had sun and no wind," said Yurlova-Percht, the individual women's world champion in standard biathlon in 2015.

"For sure, I am glad about our first place and want to thank the whole team."

Hosts Czech Republic were second with eight spare rounds, 51.2 seconds back, with Poland third.

Hosts Czech Republic clinched top honours in the junior mixed relay.

Their quartet of Tereza Vobornikova, Petra Sucha, Jakub Stvrtecky and Vitezslav Hornig won the first gold of the Championships in a time of 1:25:52.3.

They ended with just one penalty and 15 spare rounds.

It was a superb performance from the home side who led from the starting gun until the finish.

Poland, spearheaded by Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Olympian Kamila Zuk, the world junior individual and pursuit champion on the snow, won the silver.

Zuk's display meant they made the podium despite five trips to the penalty loop, and 16 spares.

They were 28.5 seconds behind the Czechs with Slovenia third, 56.5 seconds behind. 

They embarked on four penalty loops and had 16 spare rounds.

Sprint competition will be held tomorrow before pursuit completes the event on Sunday (August 26).