Roman Koudelka took his fourth win this season in Sapporo. The Czech won in Japan with jumps on 133 m and 132 m and 282.9 points, followed by Kamil Stoch and Peter Prevc, the winner of Saturday's competition.

"My first jump was good, the second one wasn't really good but I had luck with the wind conditions. Of course I'm very happy about this win. Last year I didn't come to Sapporo because of my illness, but this year I'm in a good shape so I had no problems with the long trip", the Czech said after his success.

Double Olympic Champion Stoch equaled the hill record in the first round with his jump on 140 m and was in the lead after the first half of the competition. With 125.5 m in the final and 278.0 points he closely missed his second win this season. "Yesterday I had some problems with the position in the inrun, this was much better today. Everything is on the right track now and I don't feel pain in my ankle anymore. I'm going to be in top shape again soon."

Only 0.7 points behind, Peter Prevc proved his strong shape three weeks before the start of the World Championships with 135 m and 125 m and said afterwards: "I think my jumps were very good again today and I'm satisfied with the result. The conditions were again good, which is not typical for Sapporo. I'm looking forward to the upcoming competitions but as I said yesterday, the overall World Cup will be decided in Scandinavia."

Kraft not on the podium

After six podium finishes in a row, 4-Hills-Tournament winner Stefan Kraft was fourth this time. The Austrian jumped on 133.5 m and 128 m for a total of 270.0 points. Anders Fannemel jumped on 135 m in the first round, but lost his chances on a podium result with only 121 m in the final and finished fifth (266.1 points).

Ito best Japanese

Best Japanese was Daiki Ito in sixth with 258.9 points. His teammate Noriaki Kasai came in eighth with 250.6 points, 0.3 points behind Phillip Sjooen. Jernej Damjan (241.9 points) and Michael Hayboeck (241.2 points) completed the Top 10. Behind Piotr Zyla, Richard Freitag and Markus Eisenbichler were the best of the German team in 12th and 13th. Vincent Descombes Sevoie shared this 13th place with Eisenbichler. With Ronan Lamy Chappuis in 27th, both French athletes scored World Cup points.

Tepes not as good as Saturday

After strong results recently, Jurij Tepes was only 23th this time, the only Swiss competitor in the final round was Gregor Deschwanden in 28th.

Stefan Kraft remains in the lead of the overall World Cup with 1007 points. Peter Prevc is now 83 points behind. Michael Hayboeck follows in third with 873 points, Roman Koudelka is fourth (816 points). Severin Freund, who did not compete in Sapporo, is now 254 points behind the top.

The World Cup will continue in Willingen next weekend, then the last large hill competitions before the World Championships in Falun will be held in Titisee-Neustadt.