Olympic gold for Maren Lundby

Norway's Maren Lundby is the second Olympic champion in the history of ladies' Ski Jumping. The 23-year-old won a dramatic and exciting Olympic competition on the HS 109 hill in PyeongChang on Monday evening ahead of Katharina Althaus of Germany and Japanese Sara Takanashi. Defending champion Carina Vogt came in fifth.

All three athletes could claim their first Olympic medal. Maren Lundby was eighth in Sochi four years ago, Katharina Althaus finished 23rd in Sochi and Sara Takanashi, who was the top favorite at the last Olympics, finished fourth back then.

Lundby jumped on 105.5 m and 110 m and scored 264.6 points. "I was more nervous before my first jump than before the second one. I had this strange feeling, I don't know what it was. I was not completely sure if my plan for today would work. For the second jump, I felt more in control of what I needed to do. I have tried only to keep my mindset on myself and not let anything distract me. I feel that I managed that quite well", Lundby explained after the competition.

Katharina Althaus presented herself in a great shape and showed jumps of 106.5 m and 106 m. But with 252.6 points she was already 12 points behind the winner, Lundby was simply unbeatable this evening. 21-year-old Althaus, who won three World Cups so far, confirmed her strong performances of this World Cup winter. "My goal was to finish on the podium and I'm very happy that I could achieve this goal. This is Ski Jumping, we know that it is windy, but this is the sport", said Althaus.

Japan's Sara Takanashi was also happy and satisfied with her third place. "This is my first medal at Olympic Games, it was a big challenge for me to win this medal and now I'm really relieved.  I'm very happy and I want to thank the fans, there are so many Japanese here", said Takanashi.

With Ramona Straub in eighth and Juliane Seyfarth in tenth, the German ladies achieved an outstanding team result. The Austrians, with Daniela Iraschko-Stolz in sixth and Chiara Hoelzl and Jacqueline Seifriedsberger in 11th and 13th showed a strong team performance as well.

17-year-old Junior World Champion Nika Kriznar came in on a great seventh place and the Malsiner sisters took strong results for Italy in 15th and 18th.

Carina Vogt, the 2014 Olympic champion, was satisfied with her performance, even if she could not defend her title. "I'm satisfied with myself, I didn't have the best conditions but I still finished fifth. I can live with that", said Vogt, who proved to be a true fighter in this high-level competition. Russia's Irina Avvakumova was strong fourth in today's event.

The Olympic Games in PyeongChang are now over for the ladies. The next World Cup will be held in Rasnov (ROU) on March 3rd and 4th.