German hattrick in Courchevel!

German hattrick in Courchevel!

16/08/2013 13:07

(Andreas Wellinger) SkiJumpingItaly 2013 - (c) Kathrin Müller What a day it has been in Courchevel for the German delegation yesterday.

They did not just dominate the mixed team the day before but Werner Schuster's guys made it sure there was no chance for anyone to face such a strong team as this one.

Man of the day yesterday was like in Wisla Andreas Wellinger, the soon to be 18 year old has won the race basically after his first jump. He get 131.5m for both jumps ending the day with a final score of 310.4 pts! The young talent from Ruhpolding (GER), is the main man inside the german team at the moment, after two wins in a row and a really good shape. The second place went to last year Summer Grand Prix winner Andreas Wank, which ended the day with a final score of 283.6 pts (26.8 pts behind Wellinger!), as for the third place it went to the German veteran Michi neumayer, which concluded the day with a score of 283.3 pts. There is not doubts that the long work made since Werner Schuster arrival has started -slowly- to paid off, but Schuster never hide that his job was meant to be for future results not quick ones.

Germany has slowly grew up and back in the center of the stage where they always been. After Hannawald retirement and Schmitt not being the same as he used to be, has been a bit of a downfall for the german team, but now with likes of Freitag, Wellinger, Wank, Freund and Neumayer looking to the future is not so disappointing anymore, especially at few months away from the Winter Game in Sochi. What made the day a bit different was the imposition made by two single nations above the others. After the first round we’ve had in the first 7 places just two nations, Germany and Poland.

At the end of the race Poland have placed four in the top 11, at 4th, 6th, 8th, 10th and 11th with Kamil Stoch as the best amongst the polish and with the young Ziobro (winner of the qualification round earlier in the day) finishing at 8th place, not bad results at all for these two nations, which they both seems to have found the right balance and continuity thanks to their coach and young talents.

Tom Hilde the best for the Norwegian:

Is not a secret that Norway didn’t take this summer grand prix so seriously,using it probably as a perfect training ground for the future winter competitions. Since the SGP has started Alex Stoeckl guys have all found difficult to do well, with the only good result came yesterday with the 5th place from Tom Hilde. Last year best team in Ski- jumping is currently struggling to get in the right shape for the winter competitions and probably like other teams to be ready for the Olympic Games in Russia next February.

Norway is not just the ones who is not taking those SGP so seriously as both Gregor Schlierenzauer and Thomas Morgenstern still have to compete at one of the races. Russia also have most of the A team training in Russia. Janne Ahonen keeps improving, his results so far cannot be describe as so bad in fact the Finnish champion, who made his second comeback from retirement this season, has finished at 15th place yesterday behind a good Mackenzie Boyd-Clowes from Canada.

As for another champion, yesterday wasn’t certainly a good day, Simon Ammann has in fact ended the day at 27th place with young team mate Gregor Deschwanden finishing above him at 25th place.

Next stop will be in Einsiedeln this weekend.

• by [@KokkaMufc]