Eric Frenzel claims fifth individual victory of the season

Eric Frenzel continues as the dominator of this season and delivered his next season win in a dominating fashion. Even with taking it slower on the last metres, he still finished 24.2 seconds ahead of teammate Johannes Rydzek, who battled his was on to the podium from position 25. Magnus Moan returns to the podium after an absence of over a year - his last triumph was in Ramsau am Dachstein in 2015. Moan finished 25.9 seconds behind the winner.

Mario Seidl claimed a surprising jumping win as he beat dominator Eric Frenzel, who especially likes the hill in Predazzo, fair and square today. Both jumped from gate 16 and while Seidl had a fantastic, clean jump, which resulted in 132 metres, Frenzel had already landed at 126 metres. 133.1 points gave Seidl a 26-second advantage and the pole position for the race. Frenzel’s compatriot Terence Weber followed on rank three. He achieved 128.5 metres (121.9 p.), which meant 45 seconds to make up on the track.

Local hero Samuel Costa did not disappoint. He jumped 121 metres in difficult conditions and conquered the fourth position at the intermediate point of the race. He started only one second behind Weber. Magnus Krog, who had won in Val di Fiemme last year, followed on rank five and with 48 seconds to catch up, he certainly was one of the contenders for the podium again, together with Japan’s superstar Akito Watabe. With a jump of 122 metres (118.9 p.), Watabe had 57 seconds to make up in the race.

The dominators from Team Germany had to live with slightly worse starting positions today, as both Johannes Rydzek and Fabian Rießle did not have their best jumps. For them, times behind the leader of one minute and 45 seconds and two minutes and 36 seconds showed up on the result list. Rydzek was in the good company of Magnus Moan and Jørgen Graabak from Norway who both started at +1:43 and formed a fast group of pursuers.

The race turned into a Frenzel gala performance quite quickly when the bearer of the yellow bib closed the gap to leader Seidl upon leaving the stadium on the second lap. As Seidl had just returned from a forced break due to sickness, he had no hopes of staying with the German. From this point on, Frenzel skied a lonely race at the top and kept his pursuers at a distance of about 40 seconds for the entire duration of the race. In the end, he simply enjoyed his „victory lap“ while the fight for the remaining podium positions raged in full force behind him.

A group of ten pursuers had formed during the first lap and this group was joined by the fast train consisting of Rydzek, Moan and Graabak shortly after the halfway point of the race. The decision, however, was made on the final stretch. Going down into the stadium, Johannes Rydzek had the position in front of the group and was not to be beaten in a finish line sprint. Magnus Moan was overjoyed to celebrate his return to the podium with the third position after a very difficult start to the season 2016/17. His young teammate Espen Andersen claimed rank four, a career-best for the 23-year-old. Magnus Krog and Ilkka Herola decided ranks five and six in a finish line sprint and only the finish photo was able to declare Krog the winner of this duel. Local hero Samuel Costa collected another great result on rank seven, his third consecutive Top Ten position.