Maren Lundby celebrated her first world cup victory at today´s competition in Nizhny Tagil (RUS). The 22-year old Norwegian performed a great comeback and climbed up the ranking from 6th to first place in the final round. Jumps to 91,5 and 95,5 meters brought her 229,6 points and the win ahead of Daniela Iraschko-Stolz and Sara Takanashi.
Lundby´s dream comes true
Lundby said afterwards: „Im am very happy today and a little bit nervous. This was my dream and my goal for many years. I didn’t expect to win after the first round but my second jump was really good.“ Austria´s Daniela Iraschko-Stolz was not less happy after her performance with jumps to 96,0 and 92,0 meters. 5,5 points where missing to the top. „I’m feeling very good right now. My jumps are getting better and better since Lillehammer and my knee feels better then i expected. But I am also glad that we will have a little break now before the next competitions.“
Takanashi with new hill record
Sara Takanashi seemed on the best way to the third victory of the season after setting a new hill record with 102,0 meters in the first round. Only 86,0 meters in the final took her advantage away. With a score of 218,3 points Takanashi finished third. „I was surprised after the first round because I did not know it was a new hill record. My second jump was not that good. I will try to do better tomorrow again.“ Teammate Yuki Ito, twice second in Lillehammer, came in fourth this time with her best jump to 88,0 meters in the final round.
Japan and Austria very strong
Jaqueline Seifriedsberger on 5th place with 208,4 points underlined the Austrian-Japanese dominance. Ema Klinec confirmed her good training performance and was the best Slovenian on 6th place, Coline Mattel from France performed very steady and came in 7th.
German team steady
Even though a few meters where missing to the podium, the German team still is on a good way with Katharina Althaus coming in 8th and Svenja Wuerth, Carina Vogt and Anna Rupprecht on places 11, 12 and 13. The Russian athletes could not quite satisfy the hopes of the home ground. After a very strong first jump and place four Anastasiya Barannikova still dropped down to 19 place. So Irina Avvakumova was the best Russian on 9th place. Japan´s Yuka Seto completed the top ten. Sarah Hendrickson from USA struggled a little with the Nizhny Tagil hill and came 14th, just ahead of the three Slovenians Maja Vtic, Nika Kriznar and Spela Rogelj. Manuela Malsiner was the best Italian, finishing 21st followed by the best French jumper Lea Lemare and Romania´s Daniela Haralambie.
Henrich and Kykkaenen scoring
Taylor Henrich on 26th place and Julia Kykkaenen on 27th place secured points for Canada and Finland. The second competition in Nizhny Tagil is starting on Sunday at 2.30 pm (10.30 am CET) with the qualification.
Source: fis-ski.com
