Severin Freund wins exciting season opener
After the conditions were not really easy for the qualification and the mixed team competition on Friday with heavy rain and wind, the weather in Lillehammer was a lot better for today's individual competition on the normal hill. And so the 2012/13 season started with an exciting event on a very high level.
Like most of the the time on normal hills it was also a close decision on the Lysgardsbakken and after the first round the big sensation seemed to be possible. In his debut in the World Cup the only 17-year-old German Andreas Wellinger was sensationally in the lead after the first round with the longest jump of the day on 103 m. In the final round he could not defend this position but with the fifth place overall he still achieved an outstanding result.
Freund with yellow leaders' bib
The victory went to Wellinger's teammate Severin Freund, who came up to the top from being third after the first round with 100.5 m in the final. The 24-year-old celebrated his third win in the World Cup and had a perfect start of the season. "This was a great start for me. I'm also looking forward to tomorrow. I was second on the large hill last year and I like the hill. It was very close today, but right now I'm very happy. I don't feel any pain now and so I'm very relaxed."
Norwegians and Austrians strong
Close behind the winner, the second place went to Thomas Morgenstern with 267.2 points. With this performance the athlete of Carinthia was the best of the Austrians. With Manuel Fettner (7th) and Gregor Schlierenzauer (8th) two of his teammates were also placed in the Top 10.
Only 0.2 points behind Morgenstern, overall World Cup winner Anders Bardal achieved a podium result for the hosts of Norway, they could also show a convincing team performance. In his first World Cup competition after his year-long break Anders Jacobsen landed on a great fourth place, Anders Fannemel came in sixth.
"This was a great season opener for me. The conditions were perfect today and the best won", said Bardal who is already looking forward to the event on Sunday. "I think I can do even better on a large hill right now."
The results of Severin Freund »
Taku Takeuchi as ninth and Peter Prevc as tenth were the best jumpers of their teams of Japan and Slovenia. Behind Richard Freitag (11th), Wolfgang Loitzl (11th) and Simon Ammann (13th) the winner of the qualification, Lukas Hlava, was the best Czech as 14th.
The team of Poland had a hard time at this season opener. Only two jumpers of head coach Lukasz Kruczek reached the final. Maciej Kot was the best as 25th, Kamil Stoch was only 30th. It's also still not going very well for Finland. Janne Happonen was the only one who represented the team of Pekka Niemelae in the final round as 22nd.
Many disappointed stars
For some well-known names it was a disappointing start of the new season. The overall winner of the Summer Grand Prix, Andreas Wank, failed to make the cut for the second round as 37th, a similar fate was shared by Tom Hilde (31st), Jan Matura (35th), the best of this summer's COC, Martin Koch (38th), Jurij Tepes (41st) and ski flying World Champion Robert Kranjec (43rd).
Official training afterwards
After the normal hill competition the official training for Sunday's large hill event was held this evening.
Gregor Schlierenzauer showed the longest jump in the first round with 136,5 m. Also Tom Hilde (135 m) and Thomas Morgenstern (134.5 m) showed very good performances. The best in the second round were Richard Freitag with 138.5 m, Anders Jacobsen (136.5 m) and youngster Andreas Wellinger (132.5 m).
The qualification will take place on Sunday at 12:15 pm CET, the competition follows at 1:15 pm CET.