The Russians fired out warning shots in more ways than one as all six gold medals went their way, while only three of the 18 podium places available were occupied by a non-Russian.

Irek Zaripov started the ball rolling as he saw off the challenge of Japan's Kozo Kubo and teammate Aliaksandr Davidovich to take the sitting 7.5 kilometre title while it was a similar scenario in the men's standing race.

This time Nils-Erik Ulset was the meat in the Russian sandwich as he took silver to split third placed man Kirill Mikhaylow and winner Azat Karachurin at the Canmore Nordic Centre, built for the 1988 Calgary Olympics.

The women's standing 6km event was the only other podium that contained a non-Russian with Japan's Momoko Dekijima managing to secure a bronze medal behind second placed Natalia Bratiuk, while Alena Kaufman took top spot helped by a perfect performance in the shooting stage where she did not drop any shots.

A superb performance with the rifle saw both Marta Zaynullina and Svetlana Konovalove battle it out in a thrilling finale to the women's sitting 6km race that went the way of Zaynullina by a narrow margin in a time of 22min 20.80sec, with third place going to Nadezda Andreeva.

Vancouver 2010 gold medallist and nine-time world champion Mikhalina Lysova (right) had to settle for silver at the IPC Nordic Skiing World Cup in Canmore as teammate Iuliia Budaleeva claimed a surprise win ©Getty Images