. world ski news : Daiki Ito unbeatable towards the end of the season - 08 March 2012 - 21:03
SKI JUMPING. With an outstanding jump in the final round Daiki Ito won the World Cup competition in Trondheim. With a new hill record of 141 m the Japanese celebrated already his fourth victory this season.
With a total of 295.1 points Ito, who triumphed already in Lahti a couple of days ago, won clearly ahead of Germany's Richard Freitag, who was in the lead after the first round. There Freitag has improved the hill record with his jump on 140.5 m, but he had no chance against Ito's final jump. The 20-year-old reached a total of 287.9 points. Strong Swiss Simon Ammann was third with 285.3 points. In the final round Ammann equalled his old hill record with 140 m.
"Daiki showed an awesome jump" - praises Freitag
"It's a pity, but it's a good second place. I had a great jump on the new hill record in the first round, Daiki showed an awesome jump in the second round. I have to be satisfied", said Freitag.
Bardal had a good competition and keeps the yellow bib
Anders Bardal showed his strength in the fight for the overall World Cup. Close to his home town Steinkjer the 29-year-old had a very good jump in the second round on 136 m and finished fourth. He missed the podium by only 2.3 points, but scored important 60 points in the World Cup and extended his lead to Gregor Schlierenzauer, who was obviously angry and came in only 12th.
Best Austrian was Thomas Morgenstern as seventh, followed by Andreas Kofler, who got a little closer to Schlierenzauer in the overall ranking. But Bardal is today's winner in the fight for the yellow bib. He now has a total of 1269 points and a lead of more than 100 points ahead of Schlierenzauer, who scored 1157 points. Kofler is third with 1098 points. With only three more competitions left, Kofler has almost no chance anymore to win the title. Bardal is in a top position now.
Once again Roman Koudelka achieved a top result for the Czech team as fifth. Lukas Hlava, who was on the podium in Lahti, was 21st this time. Anssi Koivuranta was the best Finn as tenth, Severin Freund was ninth and lost a better result because of a fall after the landing of his final jump.
Swiss and Italians satisfied
The Swiss team achieved a really good result today. Not only Ammann, but also 20-year-old Marco Grigoli could score points. The 15th place was a career-best in the World Cup for Grigoli. Also the Italians will be satisfied with the 16th place of Sebastian Colloredo and the 19th place for Andrea Morassi.
Matti Hautamaeki could again not qualify for the final round. His teammate Ville Larinto failed to qualify for the competition. Of course he will count on the next season, after his serious injuries. Also Tom Hilde, Andreas Wank, Jernej Damjan and Jurij Tepes could not qualify for the final round.
FISskijumping.com
08.03.2012 19:02