The 30-year-old, who returned from a doping ban this season to win three golds at the Nordic World Ski Championships last month, triumphed yet again in a time of 1 hour 18min 54.5sec, in front of Russia's Natalia Nepryaeva and Sweden's Ebba Andersson.

They came home in second and third respectively with times of 1:20.40.4 and 1:20.44.4.

Nepryaeva, who currently sits second in the overall World Cup rankings, tried to keep pace with her Norwegian rival but was simply no match on the uphill sections.

Instead of catching the leader, the Russian had to ensure she herself was not caught by a follow-up group including Sweden's Charlotte Kalla, the current World Cup leader Ingvild Flugstad Østberg from Norway and Andersson among others.

That group split in the second half of the race with Andersson and Kalla at the front, while the former eventually took third place.

Østberg in the end had to settle for fourth, just 0.06 seconds behind.

The World Cup circuit will now move to Drammen, also in Norway, for the next event on March 12.