Scandinavian athletes were surprised to discover that other teams were much stronger. Will it take some getting used to?
The reigning ski jumping World Cup winner had a terrible performance in the first round in Ruka. Moreover, the entire Norwegian team showed this result.
Halvor Granerud and his partners are far behind the top 10, having lost without a chance to rivals from Austria and Germany. This start to the season discouraged all experts, and the reasons for the failure are now being sought in the changes in the rules that the international federation adopted in the spring.
The Scandinavians will have to accept that other teams were smarter than them.
Surprise
The fact that Austrian Stefan Kraft won both jumping sessions in Finland is not surprising. The 30-year-old athlete was second overall at the end of last season, won the team competition at the 2022 Olympics, became a three-time world champion and holds the current world record with a jump of 253.5 meters.
But his neighbors on the pedestal are a great discovery. On Saturday, 33-year-old German Pius Paschke won silver, and his compatriot Stefan Leiche won bronze. Last year, both finished the season between the third and fourth tens of the overall standings. For Paschke, this is the first medal in his career.
The next day, Paschke and Leiche were fourth and fifth, respectively, and the top three were taken by Austrian Jan Herl (13th position at the end of the 2022/2023 season) and German Andreas Wellinger (7th place).
Germany and Austria took all the medals of the first weekend of competition. Moreover, on Saturday, 12 of the first 15 places were taken by athletes from these two countries. There were eight jumpers from Austria and Germany in the top 10 on Sunday.
Of course, these teams are always among the favorites, but such a clear advantage provokes many questions. Especially from the Slovenians, Poles and Norwegians, who seemed to be watching from the outside what was happening in Finland.
What happened?
For Slovenia, Timi Zajc performed relatively well, finishing both days in eighth place, and Peter Prevc, who finished sixth on Sunday. But trouble happened to the Norwegians. Granerud was only 16th and 10th. His compatriots even fought for places in the third ten. For a country where ski jumping is the national sport, such results are dismal.
– Disaster. There is no other way to describe the beginning of the season, says Halvor Granerud
Poles Dawid Kubacki and Piotr Zyla also performed poorly – consistently outside the top 20. Although they finished last season in fourth and sixth places in the overall standings, respectively.
What happened to the leaders, and why were two teams head and shoulders above the rest? There is no definite answer, but all the reasoning revolves around the nuances of the rules added in the spring of this year.
Previously, the weight of athletes was measured in overalls, but now they are weighed without clothes. In addition, height is now determined not manually, but using a 3D scanner. Could two seemingly insignificant adjustments really lead to such a change in the balance of power in world jumping?
It seems so.
Winter version of Formula 1
Ski jumping is a technical sport, so equipment is strictly monitored here. Every additional centimeter of the overalls increases the load-bearing surface, comparable to an airplane wing.
Therefore, before each jump, judges measure the length from the ground to the bottom edge of the jumpsuit. If the discrepancy between the size of this part of the athlete’s body and the length of the overalls exceeds 3 cm, then you cannot jump. This is done to prevent manipulation. The suits are elastic, and if the athlete has a margin of 1-2 cm, then he can stretch the suit, thereby increasing his flying ability.
Probably, the new way of taking measurements from athletes somehow influenced the final results. The Austrians and Germans gained an advantage due to this innovation, but the main mystery remains unsolved – what exactly do these teams do better than the same Norwegians?
“I tried to analyze my opponents’ jumps, but nothing I saw looked new. And that annoys me,” Granerud says.
German Paschke, who won his first World Cup medal at 33, makes no secret of the fact that his success came through change.
“I can only speak for myself and say that the new rules are good for me,” notes the jumper.
There is some debate in Norway about whether this result is a fluke. Expert from the authoritative publication NRK Johan Remen Evensen emphasizes that the Scandinavians will need more than one stage to adapt.
“As a Formula 1 driver, it also takes time to get used to a new car and get it to work the way you want it to. This also applies to jumping. The new rules change the aerodynamic profile. Now we have to change the technique,” he says.
It is still difficult for Norwegians to admit that someone else was more cunning in the matter of equipment. Apparently, you’ll have to get used to it.
2023-12-01 16:00:33
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