Karl Geiger is Ski Flying World Champion (original) (raw)
Norway's Halvor Egner Granerud also did a great job today and finished second. In his first-ever Ski Flying World Championships, Granerud posted four great jumps and put a lot of pressure on Karl Geiger before his fourth and final jump. Geiger had to give his all in order to beat Granerud by just a few centimeters. It was a great fight and both would have deserved to win today.
In the end, Granerud missed the title by only 0.5 points. The 24-year-old rising star of this winter came in second. Not many expected the Norwegian to do that well on the Letalnica, a hill that he didn't really like before - Great job.
"I thought I had a chance to win today because in the fourth round I saw how far beyond the green line I landed and I knew how good the jumpers before me are. So I was hoping for the gold with that jump but unfortunately, it was just not good enough", said Granerud, who was disappointed right after the competition.
Markus Eisenbichler, who was considered the top favorite before the event, was not disappointed at all with his third place today. "I'm extremely happy, it was a tough fight on these two days between five athletes. Congratulations to Karl, I'm so happy for him. Halvor was also amazing here. It's incredible that I could win a medal, it's my sixth at World Championships. Of course, I would have loved to win the title, but the competition is strong. Now I hope that we can be on the podium again in the team competition tomorrow", said Eisenbichler.
The places four to six went to Michael Hayboeck (AUT), Robert Johansson (NOR) and Yukiya Sato (JPN). Piotr Zyla and Kamil Stoch achieved Top 10 results for Poland in seventh and eighth. Evgeniy Klimov (RUS) and Andrzej Stekala (POL) completed the Top 10 in an outstanding Ski Flying competition.
The World Championships conclude with the team event on Sunday. The competition starts at 4 pm CET.