Sara Takanashi wins twice in Almaty and grabs the Grand Prix title

Sara Takanashi wins twice in Almaty and grabs the Grand Prix title

22/09/2013 14:15

A huge display of power is what Sara Takanashi showed this weekend in Almaty, for the last two races of the 2013 Ladies Grand Prix. The young Japanese won both competitions and brought home the overall title at the end of Saturday's event, proving once again her dominance. It looks like Takanashi has no rivals on her level; the only one might be Sarah Hendrickson, who is currently injured, and Ema Klinec is showing good skills too.... The two races were affected by the wind conditions and many athletes were forced to wait on the bar before jumping.

On Saturday the 17 years old from Kamikawa placed first in both of the two rounds and classified ahead of Coline Mattel (the best athlete in what concerns the style) and a very positive Yurina Yamada. Slovenia achieved a great team performance, placing four athletes from the fourth to the eighth position: Eva Logar (4th), Katja Pozun (6th), Ursa Bogataj (7th) and Spela Rogelj (8th). Julia Kykkänen made a step forward to the olympic qualification finishing 5th, while Svenja Wuerth and Irina Avvakoumova closed the top-ten. Three on four in the points zone was the Italian lot: Evelyn Insam ended in 17th position with Elena Runggaldier two places behind; Roberta D'Agostina placed 24th, while Lisa Demetz, still recovering from a bad knee injury, was 34th. Nothing new under the Sunday's sun. Takanashi won again but wasn't able to sign the best score in the second round. Why? Because she landed at 107.5 meters (the second best performance was Manuela Malsiner's 100.5m) and she fell, closing first anyway thanks to the distance and first round's score.

Katja Pozun and Atsuko Tanaka completed the podium, followed by Eva Logar and Coline Mattel. Julia Kykkanen took a solid 6th position ahead of a surprising Taylor Henrich. The Slovenian team put once again four athletes in the top-ten: Maja Vtic shared eighth position with Julia Clair, while Spela Rogelj was 10th. Yurina Yamada couldn't repeat the day before's podium and finished eleventh ahead of her team mate Kaori Iwabuchi. Italy didn't improve Saturday's results, even if Elena Runggaldier repeated 19th position. Manuela Malsiner, who was nineth in the first part of the competition, lost many positions and ended 21st, followed by Roberta D'Agostina (23rd) and Evelyn Insam (30th). Once again, Lisa Demetz couldn't reach the second round with her 35th position.

• by Edoardo Vercellesi (@edoverce97)