Tuesday, January 04, 2022
The three-hill tournament is coming
Wind chaos causes ski jumping to be canceled
Nothing works in Innsbruck: Due to a foehn storm, the third ski jumping competition on Bergisel is canceled and will be made up for tomorrow in Bischofshofen. Jumping in Innsbruck is known for difficult weather conditions. The organizers have been trying to postpone the start for a long time.
Markus Eisenbichler and Karl Geiger squatted thickly packed in the team container while the foehn storm raged mercilessly on Bergisel: The hunt of the German ski jumping stars on tour favorite Ryoyu Kobayashi was blown with the wind in Innsbruck on Tuesday, after the inevitable cancellation it is now coming two competitions in Bischofshofen on Wednesday (trial run at 11.30 am, qualification at 1 pm and jumping at 4.30 pm) and Thursday for the second “three-hill tournament” in history.
“Innsbruck is the classic foehn capital”, said national trainer Stefan Horngacher, who “didn’t have a good feeling” in view of the gusts of over 80 km / h on the local mountain of “Windsbruck”. Because the milled inrun track also gave way when the temperatures were significantly higher in the Tyrolean capital, the cancellation was inevitable – at exactly 3 p.m. Sandro Pertile, race director of the FIS World Federation, blew everything off.
“That’s just our sport. You don’t do much against the wind. We would have liked to jump, but the safety of the athletes has priority,” said the Italian, who had initially postponed the start time from 1.30pm four times, on ZDF. Because the Bergisel is the only touring hill without floodlights, it was impossible to postpone it any further.
The jumpers, whose patience had been put to the test for several hours, finally reacted with relief. “I don’t think that there would have been a fair jumping here,” said Austria’s world champion Stefan Kraft on ORF. He and his teammates had passed the time with a few darts duels in the dressing room.
Plan B of the jury around Pertile, which was discussed with the organizers after the cancellation, did not include a new attempt on Wednesday in Innsbruck. “I think that it is not possible to try again here,” said Pertile: “In Bischofshofen we are more flexible because we have floodlights.” There will be jumping number three on the day before the tour finals on Thursday (5.30 p.m.). This was also the case in January 2008 after the competition in Innsbruck was canceled due to a foehn storm. The two following competitions in the so far only “three-hill tournament” were held within 24 hours without a knockout mode.
It was only for the sixth time since 1953 that a touring competition was postponed and / or relocated, and not a single one has yet been canceled. The organizers, however, still have a cushion to carry out the tour with four competitions this time as well: two additional World Cups are planned for Saturday and Sunday in Bischofshofen, which could be “rededicated”.
Innsbruck, where Eisenbichler and Geiger had gambled away their tour victory in the past two years, once again lived up to its reputation as a capricious ski jump diva. “The Bergisel is a stupid pig every now and then”, Eisenbichler, who became world champion in the same place in 2019, stated exactly a year ago. Now the fourth overall and Geiger (6th) have to try twice on the Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze to catch up their deficit of the equivalent of 12 and 18 meters on the escaped Japanese Kobayashi. This will be difficult enough: since Sven Hannawald 20 years ago, no German has triumphed in Bischofshofen.