Fredrik Lindstroem and Emil Hegle Svendsen were neck-to-neck entering the final shooting bout Friday.
Then, everything changed at the shooting range.
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Lindstroem managed the conditions with just one missed target while Svendsen had difficulties and, as a result, it was Sweden who departed with an uncontested breeze to the finish line.
Sweden captured its first-ever men's 4x7.5km relay gold Friday by winning the final biathlon competition of the PyeongChang Games at the Alpensia Biathlon Centre in PyeongChang, South Korea.
The team of Peppe Femling, Jesper Nelin, Sebastian Samuelsson and Lindstroem, the anchor, finished the relay 55.5 seconds ahead of silver medalist Norway.
Germany took home the bronze medal.
This time, Arnd Peiffer shot clean, and this time, Peiffer redeemed himself in a relay event.
Peiffer’s strong third leg allowed Simon Schempp, on the final leg, to keep Germany on the podium in the relay for the seventh time in the last eight Winter Olympics.
Despite Erik Lesser building a big lead for Germany on the first leg and Benedikt Doll continuing that on the first half of his leg, the range again proved costly for the Germans.
Doll missed three targets on the second shoot that erased a 35.7-second lead. Germany fell back to fifth place before Peiffer skied Germany into bronze position on the third leg.
On the final leg, though, the range gave Schempp trouble.
Coming into the first bout of the final leg, Schempp was in a position to compete with Norway and Sweden for the gold medal, but he struggled to keep up in both of his bouts.
In the mixed relay, Peiffer, who anchored for Germany, struggled in the range and cost the Germans a place on the podium despite Laura Dahlmeier and Lesser building huge leads on the second and third legs, respectively. He redeemed himself with a podium-worthy leg Friday.
The United States finished in sixth place Friday and failed to claim their first Olympic biathlon medal.