Photo: image / Eibner
With an impressive flight to the hill record, Johann Andre Forfang secured his first victory in over five years. While it initially looks like a Finnish sensational victory, the German ski jumpers have no chance in front of the home crowd.
With jumps of 144 and 155.5 meters, Johann Andre Forfang secured victory in the first of two individual competitions this weekend in Willingen. The Norwegian scored a total of 252.7 points on Saturday evening and prevailed over the Japanese Ryoyu Kobayashi, who reached 128 and 148 meters (221.7 points). Third place went to Krisoffer Eriksen Sundal (138 and 150 m; 219.9 p.), another Norwegian who achieved his best career result to date.
In constant rain and changeable wind conditions, it initially looked like Antti Aalto would have a sensational victory: The Finn was surprisingly in the lead after a strong 147.5 meters in the first round, but then fell back to 14th place in the final with 128 meters. For Forfang, it is the fourth World Cup victory of his career and the first in over five years: the 28-year-old last triumphed in December 2018 in Nizhny Tagil, Russia.
DSV ski jumper with worst result of the season
There wasn’t much to gain for the German ski jumpers in front of 23,500 spectators at the sold-out Mühlenkopfschanze: Andreas Wellinger was still in a promising seventh place after the first round and 138.5 meters, but then fell out in the final with a weak 125.5 meters back to 17th place. “I don’t want to blame it on the wind because I just didn’t jump that well today. “Tomorrow I’ll try to do it like I did in the rehearsal,” said Wellinger, who had won the rehearsal in advance.
The best German that day was local hero Stephan Leyhe, who came 15th with 131 and 135.5 meters. In addition, only Pius Paschke collected further World Cup points with 26th place.
» Event overview: Schedule & information about the World Cup weekend in Willingen
For Philipp Raimund (31st), Karl Geiger (33rd) and Felix Hoffmann (35th) the competition was over after just one jump.
“We don’t know exactly what it was. Right from the start, things didn’t work the way we imagined. We have to analyze this calmly and rebuild the boys,” said national coach Stefan Horngacher, perplexed in view of the worst result so far this season.
Three Austrians in the top ten
With Michael Hayböck (4th), Daniel Tschofenig (6th) and Manuel Fettner (7th), three Austrians ended up in the top ten and thus made up for the fact that Stefan Kraft (39th), of all people, was already the overall World Cup leader was surprisingly eliminated after the first round and a jump of 122 meters.
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“I didn’t feel anything supporting me and I still had 20 points deducted. “It feels strange, but that’s what can happen in ski jumping,” said the Austrian, who lost valuable points to his pursuer Wellinger in the fight for the overall World Cup.
He destroyed fällt zurück
In addition to the interim leader Antti Aalto, Aleksander Zniszczol from Poland also fell significantly behind in the final. Still in third place after the first round, the Pole fell back to eighth place ahead of Finn Niko Kytosaho (9th). The two Slovenians Domen Prevc (5th) and Lovro Kos (10th) also ended up in the top ten.
» World Cup calendar 2023/2024 (men): All dates at a glance
The qualification starts on Sunday at 2:30 p.m., before the ski jumpers start at 4:10 p.m. (all live at skispringen.com) fight again for important World Cup points. Before that, the ski jumpers will take part in their second individual competition this weekend from 11:15 a.m.
Find out more here at skisprung.com.