Anders Jacobsen makes it again! -Second Tournament-victory for the Norwegian in Garmisch-Partenkiche

Anders Jacobsen makes it again! -Second Tournament-victory for the Norwegian in Garmisch-Partenkichen!

01/01/2013 19:27

(Anders Jacobsen) SkiJumpingItaly 2012 - (c) Kathrin Müller

Anders Jacobsen made it again!

- The Tournament favorite wins at the New-Year's-Jumping with unbelievable jumps closely ahead of his rival Schlierenzauer.

When Anders Jacobsen went down the bakken in the first round, maybe half of the ski-jumping world nearly got a heart attack. Oberstdorf's winner was nearly blown away because of a mistake at the beginning of his fly! But he stabilized his flying position and sailed down to 131m. It seemed, the victory would be worlds away for him after "only" being ninth after the first round regarding the really strong rivalry. Schlierenzauer flashed by and took the lead after the first round ahead of Tom Hilde and Kamil Stoch, who shared the second place with jumps of 133.5m and 142m! Oh, how emotional it was to see Stoch nearly break the hill record (which is 143.5m set by Simon Ammann)! They were followed by Jaka Hvala (136m), Anders Bardal (136.5m), Maciej Kot (134.5m) and the delightful Martin Schmitt (131m). But the cubes turned around in the final round, when Jacobsen performed 143m with a marvelous telemark that brought him points from 19.0 to 19.5! No one was able to tickle his position. Hilde fell back, as did Stoch. Bardal was closer behind than the rest but still 10points away from Jacobsen. No one was able to reach his points. Schlierenzauer was last on the bakken. He gave his best and landed 136.5m -and lost the victory to Jacobsen, who has been 0.9points better than him! So the Austrian had no chance but to take the second place in today's competition. Bardal completed the podium.

(Tom Hilde) SkiJumpingItaly - (c) Consuelo Conte

Man of the day Tom Hilde missed the podium by only 0.8points after a 138m- jump, the third best length in this competition. Unfortunately his landing hasn't been the best, which cost him a place in the top three. But here we see he's on the best way! If he continues like this, the third in the Tournament-overall could be able to be a danger for Schlierenzauer and Co.

Now let's go back to the first round and it's crazy duels:

Sebastian Colloredo was able to improve by showing 125m but it was clear that his chances against Freund (129.5m) would be little.

Lukas Hlava on the other hand was more or less already in the final round before he even jumped- by he lost his balance in the outrun and fell after 128m. This was the out for the best Czech.

Martin Schmitt had to shake a lot because Jan Matura surprisingly has been far-out with 132m! But Schmitt countered with 131m although his conditions have been worse. This made Matura the best lucky loser- he even went to the second round on position number eight.

Kot was really beating himself with 134.5m and put 135m on top in the final round! He really deserves the fifth place for this lovely performance today!

Again, Manuel Fettner won the battle against his German opposite. This time he succeded against Danny Queck, who souvereignly made it as a lucky loser again.

The last remaining Finn in the Tournament is Lauri Asikainen, since the rest of the team already left the scene and will not compete in Austria. Thanks to 127m by him, Finland didn't lose its face completely.

Anders Fannemel (132m) declassed Roman Koudelka with an advantage of only 2 meters. The Czech jumper is finding his form right now and will most likely be even harder to beat in the upcoming races!

Also Robert Kranjec is on the best way to the top again: He won his duel against Rune Velta with 130.5m, making Velta the second best lucky loser (128.5m). Kranjec finished 13th in the end- a result he might only have dreamed of two weeks ago. Velta on the other hand fell back to rank 26.

Again, Germany can be proud of youngster Andreas Wellinger, who jumped 133m against his namesake Stjernen.

Also Morgenstern can be happy about points. The Austrian, who has been pushed out of the competition in Oberstdorf by Ilia Rosliakov, jumped 133m, too, and landed on place eleven with this.

Maximilian Mechler from Germany, who was one of the youngest Tournament-participants once, overtook Wolfgang Loitzl at difficult conditions. Unfortunately The Austrian didn't even have chances through the lucky losers. Vladimir Zografski recommended himself with 134m in the final round.

The duel Simon Ammann versus Kamil Stoch was the most bitter one. Ammann, who's biggest wish is it to win the Four-Hills-Tournament once, left the competition after 124m, while Stoch overtook him by unbelievable 18m.

As maybe predicted before, Andreas Kofler lost against Anders Jacobsen, but got the fifth place on the lucky loser list and went into the final round. He became 19th finally.

Martin Schmitt, who maybe made the best comeback out of the middle class, has been best German after the first round on rank seven and missed the top ten by only 0.5 points on the 14th place. His team mates finished one rank nine (Wellinger), eleventh (Wank), 15th (Freund), 21st (Neumayer), 22nd (Mechler), 23rd (Queck) and 25th (Freitag).

Is this the end for a top result for the third from Oberstdorf Freund? He's now fifth in the Tournament overall-ranking.

And now let's discuss the question, who of the German athletes will be allowed to travel to Austria for the second half of the Four-Hills-Tournament?

Andreas Wellinger SkiJumpingItaly 2012 - (c) Kathrin Müller

Six jumpers have to be chosen by head coach Schuster. Freund is definitely set as he's the best in the tournament now. Also Neumayer and Wellinger should already have their tickets for Austria. But what about the rest? Martin Schmitt was always a tipsy candidate. But after his amazing results (place 16 and 14, and being fourth German on the overall ranking) it would not only be cruel but also very unsportive to send him home. This Martin Schmitt that we've seen during the last week needs to be a happy part of the Tournament still. So I'll go for Schmitt. But who should stay away from now on? Karl Geiger will be one of the losers, as will be Felix Schoft. Maximilian Mechler, Danny Queck, Richard Freitag or Andreas Wank- who will make it into the team? All of them jumped into the final round today. Queck has been lucky loser twice but also had big rivals. Wank has been out of the first competition after his duel with Schmitt. This made him the last of those Germans on the overall-ranking. Mechler has been stable with a 24th and a 22th place, while Freitag degraded himself with a 15th and a 25th rank. I don't really want to be in Schuster's position now. So let's stay tuned to find out more about, who's able to compete in Austria.

That was the New-Year's-Jumping in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Tomorrow, we'll have a day to take a breather from the Tournament before the circus arrives in Innsbruck on the third. Will Anders Jacobsen be able to repeat all this again? Will he even break the record of Sven Hannawald? Or will Gregor Schlierenzauer strike back? We will find out about this soon!

• by Peggy Kierstan (@pikayartist)

#news #fourhillstournament