Stefan Kraft takes his second gold in Lahti

With a total of 279.3 points and two jumps of 127.5 m normal hill World Champion Stefan Kraft was also the best on the large hill. Only 1.3 points behind, Andreas Wellinger (GER) came in second again with 127.5 m and 129 m. The third place went to Poland's Piotr Zyla, who took the first medal for his team with 276.7 points (127.5 m and 131 m). Norway's Andreas Stjernen was fourth only 0.6 points behind the podium.

It was a very close competition in both rounds. After the first round, the best severn ski jumpers were seperated by only five points, this is less than three meters. Stefan Kraft was 0.9 points or half a meter ahead of Andreas Wellinger; Andreas Stjernen was third and only 2.6 points behind the first, fourth-placed Kamil Stoch, who finished seventh overall, was 2.9 points behind Kraft. Piotr Zyla was 4.8 points behind the half-time leader in sixth.

First Austrian double World Champion

Stefan Kraft made Ski Jumping history: He is the first Austrian ski jumper to win both individual titles at one WSC. So far there were only five double World Champions. The last one to achieve this was Adam Malysz 2003 in Val di Fiemme. Malysz is currently working as athletic director for Ski Jumping and Nordic Combined with the Polish Ski Association. "I don't care that I made history today, probably this will matter when I retired", said Stefan Kraft. The 23-year-old from Salzburg was more than happy about winning is second gold medal: "Incredible, I don't know how I deserved this. Everything worked out well for me today. The second jump was extremely good, but I already knew that it would be close when I landed. I was a lot more relaxed than on the normal hill, when Andreas Wellinger was jumping before me", said the three-time medalist of the Championships in Lahti, who also won silver in the mixed team event last Sunday. With his performance he also impressed his his coach Heinz Kuttin: "The jumps he had today were amazing. I have the highest respect for how he is performing here. He always has an answer."

Although he finished "only" second again, like on the normal hill, team World Champion Andreas Wellinger was extremely happy about his second silver medal: "It's amazing, sensational. I would have never thought that I could win silver twice here in Lahti", said the 21-year-old from Ruhpolding. In the final round he scored 2.7 distance points more than his rival Stefan Kraft, who got 57.5 style points, while Wellinger only scored 55.0. "I don't know how Stefan can be two points better, I probably have to check the landings. It was a competition on a very high level and I was close to the top again. It's fun to have fights like these", said the German.

This time it was enough for bronze

On the normal hill World Cup leader and 4-Hills-Tournament winner Kamil Stoch missed the bronze medal by only 1.1 points and finished fourth. Poland couldn't win a medal. This time they had more luck, but again it wasn't Kamil Stoch. His teammate Piotr Zyla stepped up and had the longest jump of the day with 131 m in the final round. The 30-year-old, only 19th in the normal hill competition, won his first medal at World Championships and the Polish fan favorite was overwhelmed after the competition: "I still don't know what happened here today. It will take some time until I realize it."

Poland and Norway with strong performances

Not only Zyla, the entire Polish team of coach Stefan Horngacher showed a convincing performance. Behind the bronze medalist, Maciej Kot, Kamil Stoch and Dawid Kubacki finished on the places 6 to 8. This result makes them the top favorites for the team event on Saturday. The Norwegians also underlined their ambitions for this competition. The couldn't win a medal, but with Stjernen (4th), Anders Fannemel (5th) and Daniel Andre Tande (10th) the team of Alex Stoeckl was almost as strong as Poland.

Ammann improved

Simon Ammann achieved his best results this World Cup season in 11th and 14th in Sapporo. On the normal hill the four time Olympic Champion (2002 and 2010) was only 21st. Today the 35-year-old jumped on 122.5 m in the first round and showed a telemark, that earned him his best judges' marks this season: 3 x 17.5. Ammann was the best Swiss in 14th after the first round. In the final he was able to defend this position with 125.5 m. He was the only Swiss in the final round of the Top 30. It was a disappointing day for the Japanese, who won bronze in the mixed team event: Daiki Ito was their best in 15th, veteran Noriaki Kasai was only 32nd in his 41st competition at World Championships.

Like Switzerland and the USA, Finland also had four jumpers in the competition. With Ville Larinto (26th), Janne Ahonen (27th) and Jarkko Määttä (30th), three made the cut for the final. Only Antti Aalto, the winner of the qualification, closely missed the second round in 31st.