COC: German podium sweep in Whistler
Mar 22, 2022·Nordic Combined
The second station of the FIS Nordic Combined Continental Cup USA tour was hosted by the upcoming FIS Junior World Ski Championships organizers in Whistler (CAN).
On 18./19. March two Individual Gundersen competitions were on the program for the Nordic Combined men.
The weekend started with a surprise right away, when only four nations were entered with Austria, Germany, Italy and the USA. However, since at least five nations must start in order to carry out a COC, Nathaniel Mah, who had ended his active career two years ago, returned from retirement at short notice in order to add another nation to the starting list with Canada.
With the longest jump of the day at 101.5 meters and 130.4 points, Thomas Rettenegger was in the lead after the Ski Jumping round on the HS 105 in the Whistler Olympic Park.
Second place went to Nick Siegemund (101 m, 126.6 pts), who started the 10 km run 15 seconds behind the Austrian.
His German Wendelin Thannheimer (96.5 m, 119.3 pts) finished third, 44 seconds behind the leader and tied with Marc Luis Rainer (97 m, 119.3 pts) from Austria.
In an exciting cross-country race, there was a gripping sprint between David Mach and Rainer on the home stretch, which the Austrian lost by 0.1 seconds.
Mach, who had the fastest skiing time of 25:29.4 min, fought his way up from 6th place after Ski Jumping and secured the first Continental Cup victory of his career.
Behind Rainer, Lange (+1.1 sec) fought his way into third place, just ahead of Wendelin Thannheimer (+1.3 sec), who reached the finish line in a photo finish at the same time as Thomas Rettenegger (+1.3 sec).
The second competition in Whistler took place on Saturday.
Thomas Rettenegger was again in the lead after the Ski Jumping round. With 99 meters and 127.4 points, the Austrian positioned himself in front of overall COC leader Jakob Lange from Germany, who reached the furthest distance of the day with 100 meters (122.8 pts) and took an 18 second deficit to Rettenegger into the 10 km cross-country race.
The German Nick Siegemund (97 m, 121.7 pts) took 3rd place, 23 sec behind.
Lange, who had already impressed with great cross-country performances in the past, crossed the finish line first for the eighth time this season.
Second place went to Friday's winner David Mach (+6.4 sec), who completed the German podium sweep together with Wendelin Thannheimer (+7.7 sec).
With his victory and a 272-point lead over David Mach, Jakob Lange is already the 2021/22 Overall Continental Cup winner before the last two competitions in Lake Placid (USA).
)
)
