Rydzek, also a double Olympic medallist, started the cross-country section of the event with a deficit of over a minute but produced an excellent skiing performance to cross the line in a time of 23min 01.7sec.

Rießle finished the race 2.8sec adrift of his team-mate, with Japan’s Akito Watabe coming through to take third.

The result ended the run of dominance of Germany’s Eric Frenzel, who had won six World Cup events coming into today’s competition in Chaux-Neuve.

It allowed Rydzek to cut the lead of the defending World Cup champion and Olympic gold medallist to 34 points as Frenzel ended outside of the podium spots in fourth position.

Rydzek began the 10 kilometres race 1:15 behind leader Jarl Riiber of Norway after he finished the ski jumping in 12^th place.

The German leapt a distance of 117 metres, which earned him a total of 120.3 points.

Riiber, who topped qualification yesterday, produced a jump of 112m and comfortably topped the standings with 139.

The Norwegian struggled to keep pace with the rest of the field in the cross-country, however, and eventually finished down in 15^th.

Frenzel had given himself a decent chance of picking up his seventh win of the campaign as he was third after the ski jumping round.

The 28-year-old scored 125.8 thanks to a jump of 190.5m, which meant he started the race just 0.53sec behind Riiber.

Rydzek and Frenzel are set to resume their battle for the overall crown when the second competition of the weekend in Chaux-Neuve takes place tomorrow.