Four Hills Tournament 2022/23: Halvor Egner Granerud despite second place in Innsbruck before overall victory

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Celebrating second place like a win: Halvor Egner Granerud

Photo:

Grzegorz Momot / EPO

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The German ski jumping legend and today's TV expert Sven Hannwald announced before the third jump of the Four Hills Tournament in Innsbruck that he had the key with him.

»The key to the most exclusive club on the tour«.

The club of those athletes who could win all four jumps of a Four Hills Tournament, the so-called Grand Slam of ski jumping.

It currently has three members, in addition to Hannawald, the Japanese Ryōyū Kobayashi and the Pole Kamil Stoch are admitted.

After Halvor Egner Granerud's second place, one thing is certain: the three will stay together for at least a year.

Head out, jump on:

The question marks before Granerud's second jump were big.

What is the Norwegian doing?

Does he start thinking again?

Granerud is considered a thoughtful jumper, someone who quarrels when things don't go according to plan.

And after he only jumped to 123 meters in the first round with a tailwind, the competition hoped to catch the dominator after all.

But then Granerud came, lay down on the air cushion that the slight updraft gave him and sailed down the Bergiselschanze.

133 meters, no one jumped further that day.

In the end, that was just not enough for the day's win, but Granerud's lead in the overall standings is still impressive.

The result:

Poland's Dawid Kubacki won the Innsbruck Wind Lottery just ahead of Granerud and Anže Lanišek.

In the overall ranking, Kubacki nibbled 5.5 points off the huge deficit on Granerud, but still needs a medium ski jumping miracle if he still wants to snag overall victory.

Here's the message.

Innsbruck is just Innsbruck:

In the first round, the Bergisel ski jump once again lived up to its reputation as the most wind-prone station in the Ski Jumping World Cup.

In the beginning, the draft came slightly from the front, which ski jumpers love because they can then be carried down towards the valley.

Then the wind turned, blowing from the side - and then from behind.

On other ski jumps this is even easier to cope with.

But the small facility in Innsbruck doesn't forgive any mistakes anyway.

If you don't hit the jump perfectly and then get pushed down from behind, you have no chance of a big jump.

This even applies to someone like Granerud.

The winner of the first two stations lost a lot of meters in the first round.

His competitor Kubacki, on the other hand, caught almost optimal flight conditions,

Karle alone at home:

After his catastrophic performance on Tuesday, when Karl Geiger failed to qualify, the best German ski jumper left open whether he would support his colleagues on the final day on the hill.

In the end he decided not to go on a trip, the pain after the shame was too great, he watched on TV.

From a German point of view, Geiger missed: nothing.

The best DSV eagle was the young Philipp Raimund, who once again underlined his strong form and flew in 13th place.

With 18th place, Andreas Wellinger gambled away the last chance of a decent place in the overall classification.

And Markus Eisenbichler achieved a second round for the first time on this tour, but ended up third from last.

"The mood in the team is crappy right now," Eisenbichler admitted frankly.

High standards:

Not only the German team has lost all chances of an absolute top placement since the New Year's competition, also with co-host Austria it was clear: The overall victory will not work again.

When the grandstand at the Bergisel ski jump was only sparsely filled during the rehearsal, one of the tour organizers said: "Oh dear, the Innsbruckers, the Tyroleans, they're just hard to get excited about." But for the main competition, the cauldron filled up, 19,700 fans found their way to the ski jump, many with red-white-red flags, which were distributed by a brewery.

And because the stadium DJ gave it his all and unpacked his entire musical repertoire, from the "Danube Waltz" to the après-ski hit "Auffe aufn Berg", there was still a great atmosphere.

In the end, Stefan Kraft, Michael Hayböck,

Compensatory justice:

In the second round, the wind came from behind from the start.

Incessantly he pressed the jumpers to the ground.

But then it was as if the weather gods had mercy on Granerud, who previously had the most difficult conditions of all top jumpers.

Things turned around before the Norwegian got on track.

Suddenly there was a gentle updraft from the sparsely snow-covered Nordkette, which the Norwegian took advantage of immediately.

In 2021 Granerud missed all chances with 15th place in Innsbruck, this time he stayed cool - and was lucky.

As soon as Granerud had landed, it blew from behind again.

Jumper after jumper fell behind the tour leaders.

Only Kubacki caught up with Granerud, although he jumped a whopping 11.5 meters less, but the conditions were much more difficult.

When Kubacki landed, Granerud cheered.

He knew: The victory of the day is gone,

Good morning:

On Tuesday evening light but persistent rain had set in in Innsbruck.

The soft snow, or what was left of it, was completely softened.

But because ski jumpers find it difficult to land in the slush snow, the organizers sent out a pedal team.

Around 20 men with skis on their feet flattened the outrun of the ski jump.

From four o'clock in the morning.

This is how it goes on:

Already on Thursday the ski jumpers try to qualify for the Epiphany jumping in Bischofshofen on Friday.

Granerud will then try to extend his 23.3 point lead over Kubacki, the equivalent of almost 13 metres, to the finish line.

Huge distances are possible on the Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze.

In its current form, Granerud would have to think hard to lose so much.