It happens so quickly. “It got off to a bumpy start on Friday,” says Andreas Wellinger. “And on Sunday it came to a pretty grand end.”
Ski jumping in Klingenthal, the first home World Cup this winter – and the German team continues to perform strongly. When it started in the far north of Finland a few weeks ago, the German ski jump specialists immediately positioned themselves in the top ten. The little Austrian Stefan Kraft showed great sport on the hill every week and won the first four competitions.
But Wellinger and Co. were on Kraft’s heels from the start. In Vogtland the omens then changed. This is nothing unusual in the sensitive outdoor sport of ski jumping. “The others look at those who are at the forefront,” says Wellinger about the strategy of learning as much as possible from the competition. “But we look to ourselves.”
“Incredibly happy”
For good reason, because suddenly it’s the Germans who are greeting from the top. Without exception, Karl Geiger enjoyed exhilaration at the World Cup station in Klingenthal. When it came to aerodynamically whizzing down the inrun lane, getting to the perfect take-off point and finding the cushion in the air for just a few seconds that would carry the jumpers particularly far down the slope, Geiger was in a class of his own.
Once again, because the Oberstdorfer, like his teammate Wellinger, is one of the world’s best experts in his field. “The qualification wasn’t that crazy,” says Geiger. “But now I’m incredibly happy that the jumps came and I made it again in the competition.”
Two wins for the 30-year-old. “Simply fantastic,” says Stefan Horngacher after the first three World Cup weeks. With eight podium places and two wins, national coach Horngacher’s team has already equaled the record for the entire last season. Successes that arouse desire and allow “Team D” to look optimistically towards the approaching Four Hills Tournament.
“We’ve been close to the sauna so many times,” says Wellinger, who, like the surprise Swiss runner-up Gregor Deschwanden, set the hill record in Vogtland with 146.5 meters in a rousing competition. “I can promise everyone: we also want to win the tour. Unfortunately, in the end only one person can do that.”
Paschke’s meteoric rise
With Geiger and Wellinger, the Germans have “two irons in the fire,” as not only former world champion Martin Schmitt thinks. The entire structure is currently as good as it has rarely been before. Since the start of the World Cup in Finland three weeks ago, Pius Paschke, an athlete who can hardly believe his rise, has leapt into the spotlight like a meteor. “We have a lot of class in the team,” says Wellinger.
Jumped into focus: Pius Paschke : Image: dpa
Paschke, at 33 the senior of the German distance hunters, even jumped to second place at the start of the season in the white winter landscape of Ruka. The Munich player has never been so good in singles. Anyone who currently looks at the overall ranking of ski jumpers will find Paschke in fourth place. In front of him are two teammates, Wellinger and Geiger, who, thanks to the ski jumping festival in Klingenthal, have shortened the gap to leader Kraft, who finished ninth behind Paschke in Vogtland.
“There are just days when things go like crazy,” says Wellinger about the strong performance of the German ski jumpers, because the experienced Stephan Leyhe, seventh overall, is also part of national coach Horngacher’s famously successful quartet.
Enjoying the moment without losing your grip on the ground: That’s what Geiger recommends, despite all the enthusiasm about his recent successes. “There are no guarantees in ski jumping. You always have to focus and keep going so that it works.” But it is also true: Geiger and Wellinger are currently showing jumps “at a level where it is possible to win,” as the Allgäu native describes it. During his double coup in Klingenthal, Geiger also felt particularly motivated by the audience. “It was an incredibly great atmosphere. When you win in front of such an audience, it gives you goosebumps. That’s a huge push.”
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Two and a half weeks left. Then you jump at the Oberstdorfer Schattenberg. Then it’s time for the Four Hills Tournament. “We have an incredibly great event ahead of us,” says the in-form Wellinger. For the self-confident German ski jumpers, the Swiss monastery village of Engelberg will be the right springboard for the tour next weekend.
