Four jumps, eight jumps, one goal: winning the Four Hills Tournament. It’s every ski jumper’s dream. The last German who was allowed to raise the Golden Eagle into the Bischofshofen evening sky on Epiphany was Sven Hannawald. That was 22 years ago. “It’s our turn again,” says the now 49-year-old Erzgebirge native.
When the German ski jumping specialists race down the ski jump on Schattenberg for the first time this Thursday (4:30 p.m. on ARD and Eurosport) to qualify for the opening competition of the 72nd Four Hills Tournament, all hell will break loose in Oberstdorf. That’s always the case, because in the Allgäu Valley of Ski Jumps there is particularly great enthusiasm for the sensitive outdoor sport of ski jumping. The 25,000 tickets were sold out months ago.
“A great development”
Three Germans ambitiously crossing the Bakken have not happened in this constellation for years. It’s not just overall World Cup leader Stefan Kraft who has high hopes of winning the tour. Andreas Wellinger, Pius Paschke and Karl Geiger have also put themselves in an excellent position since the start of the World Cup in mid-November.
Directly behind the dominant Austrian Kraft, they are a strong unit in the ranking. “The tour seems to be able to increase its importance in public perception from year to year,” says Stefan Horngacher. “This is a great development for our sport. We want to use the large ski jumping stage and present ourselves in the best possible way,” adds the national coach.
Horngacher is not a loudspeaker. The 54-year-old Tyrolean chooses his words carefully, and when he says “that we are a very quick-witted team,” it is almost like an emotional outburst. Horngacher explains the strong form of his leaders with “meticulous work”. But he also says: “The jumps have to get better.” His plan: “We have to go into attack mode and not into defense mode.” Ski jumping as a secret? “There is no secret,” says the national coach.
Team Germany, which he has looked after for almost five years, will tackle the Golden Eagle with a quintet. In addition to Wellinger, Geiger and Paschke, veteran Stephan Leyhe and the up-and-coming Philipp Raimund are also part of the core team. A sixth starting position would have been possible.
“The team spirit is great”
But record world champion Markus Eisenbichler is currently jumping weaker than ever and has been struggling in the second-class Continental Cup since the start of the season. With Geiger and the 33-year-old oldie Paschke, who recently won the dress rehearsal in Engelberg, two Germans have already triumphed in the World Cup and have gained the appropriate self-confidence for the ski jumping spectacle around the turn of the year.
“The team spirit is great,” says Horngacher. Envy has always been a foreign word among German ski jumpers. “The active players push each other and treat themselves to their successes,” says the national coach. Local hero Geiger, who lives with his wife and daughter just a few hundred meters from the Oberstdorfer Schattenbergschanze, is convinced: “We have a great chance that one of our team can be on the podium at the end of the tour.” Geiger, the last German opening winner , who thrilled the crowds with his jumps at Schattenberg in 2020, considers the potential in the team to be very great. But the father of the family also knows: “You can’t plan for success on the tour. The tour has to get rolling.”
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Consistency is key. “The tour is not a dream concert,” says Wellinger. “It takes eight top jumps on four jumps to be able to be at the top at the end. The Olympic champion knows: “Consistency and reproducibility of the jumps are the key to a place on the podium.” The fact that the Germans know all four ski jumps “inside out,” as Horngacher says, can be an advantage – but it doesn’t have to be.
A lot of things in preparation for this tour were carefully done differently. The summer simulation of the tour jumping has been canceled, as has the return to the winter home base of many years. Wellinger, Paschke, Geiger and co are now staying in a hotel just outside Oberstdorf, where they are completing their summer courses. New stimuli, old dreams: The German ski jumpers have particularly big plans for this tour.
