The stars of the FIS Ski Jumping World Cup will be taking the World Championships in Norway by storm from February 25. We let fly ourselves with some of the numbers…
39...
Polish legend Adam Malysz will lead the Poland line-up again with promising young team-mate Kamil Stoch among their number. Born in 1977, Malysz debuted in 1994–5, finishing 51st in the FIS World Cup, but then the following season he finished seventh. The next few years were a little topsy-turvy, with as low as a 57th placed overall finish in the World Cup in 1997, but for three years from 2000–1 to 2002–3, Malysz bossed the World Cup, and took a joint-record fourth Crystal Globe in 2006–7 to boot. He now has 39 individual World Cup victories. As for the World Championships, the Pole also has four titles, one in 2001, two in 2003 and one in 2007.
230.5...
He’s also breaking national records, most recently last weekend when he jumped the furthest a Polish ski jumper (ie himself) has ever jumped – 230.5m – in World Cup Ski Flying, where pure distance matters more than technique in the judging. And he’s not the only one: Norway’s Johan Remen Evensen jumped a massive 246.5m to break the Norwegian and the world record; Janne Happonen, Simon Ammann, Robert Kranjec and Andrea Morassi broke the existing records for Finland, Switzerland, Slovenia and Italy respectively. Martin Koch broke Gregor Schlierenzauer’s Austrian record of 241.5m, but Schlierenzauer had the final say with another new record of 243m just the next day…
33.5...
The hill in Vikersund, Norway last weekend was 225m of jump and a whopping 570m overall. The jump at the World Championships at Midtstubakken, in the Norwegian capital Oslo, will be a more modest but still impressive 106m, with a 10.5º gradient on take-off and a 33.5º slope on landing. Originally built in 1955, the newest addition at Midtstubakken, a brand-new ‘normal hill’, took two years to build and opened last September.
34 + 11...
Twenty-eight countries are slated to participate in this year’s World Championships. Austria has 34 men competing and 11 women. Germany, not to be outdone by their Austrian neighbours, have 57 athletes, 35 men and 22 ladies. The Dutch, on the other hand, are pinning their hopes on four jumpers, two men and two women.
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The Ski Jumping World Championships are held every two years as part of the FIS Nordic World Championships. Originally the ski jumping was an annual event, but from 1948, by which time they had become part of the FIS set-up, they were held biennially in every even year. 1983–4 was followed by 1984–5 because of the split by the FIS and the Olympics, but the two-year cycle has since continued on the odd year, bringing us to the distinctly odd 2011…
1924...
Jakob Tullin Thams was the first-ever Ski Jumping World Champion, back in January 1924 in Chamonix, France. The Norwegian won the event again two years later in Lahti, Finland. In his athlete profile on fisskijumping.com, it helpfully points out that Thams is no longer active. He was born in 1898, so this is hardly surprising, but wherever he is now, we’re sure he’d be very impressed that the championships are still in such rude health after 87 years.
2009...
Women’s ski jumping only made its debut at the last World Championships in Liberec, Czech Republic two years ago. The winner, Lindsey Van of the USA (not to be confused, of course, with alpine legend Lindsey Vonn!), later courted controversy in her outspoken criticism of the organisers of last year’s Winter Olympic Games, where women’s ski jumping is still not a sanctioned eventalth after 87 years.
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The Austrians, including newly-crowned overall World Cup individual winner Thomas Morgenstern, will be the ones to beat in the team event. Not only have they been dominating this year’s World Cup team competition, but they’ve also won five of the last six World Championship team titles. They’ve won all of the last four, in 2005 (when there were two events), 2007 and 2009. They also won in 2001. The only recent blip, when they took fifth place, was in 2003 in Predazzo, Italy. The Finns won that one.
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