Stephan Leyhe claims maiden World Cup win in Willingen

Local hero Stephan Leyhe claimed his maiden World Cup win with an outstanding performance in his home event in Willingen. In an extremely exciting competition, the 28-year-old came in ahead of Norway's Marius Lindvik and Poland's Kamil Stoch.

23500 fans brought the sold-out arena at the Muehlenkopfhill to a boil, when it was clear that Willingen-native Stephan Leyhe took his first-ever win. After the first round, Leyhe was second behind Kamil Stoch, in the final, the team World Champion then took the top spot with the longest jump of the day of 144.5 m.

"I don't really know what to say. It has always been special for me to jump here in Willingen but this year I came here in very good shape and I wanted to jump well. I always said that a Top 10 finish would be good, but I was hoping for a podium. Winning here is simply amazing", said Leyhe, whose best results so far were two second places. With his performance in this competition, also the overall win of the Willingen 5 was within reach for Leyhe.

The local hero had already won the qualification earlier today and had a lead of 22.2 points over Austria's Stefan Kraft in the overall ranking after the first of the two scheduled competitions. Due to the cancellation of Sunday's competition, Leyhe claimed the overall win and the additional prize money already today.

Second-placed Norwegian Marius Lindvik finished on the podium for the fifth time this winter. "I'm very happy about my performance today. I was struggling a bit over the last few weeks, but today I had two good jumps in the competition. It's really fun to be on the podium again. The atmosphere was great today and it's always fun to jump here", said Lindvik.

Kamil Stoch explained after the competition: "I'm very satisfied with my jumps today because they were on a really good level. I'm very happy and I'm also happy for Stephan, he deserves this win. Claiming the first win on your home hill is very special, I also took my first win in Zakopane so I know how it feels." Today the three-time Olympic champion stood on a World Cup podium for the 70th time.

Austria's Stefan Kraft remains in the lead of the overall World Cup ranking with 1113 points, ahead of Karl Geiger (1045 points) and Dawid Kubacki (940 points).

Sunday's competition canceled
A crisis management group formed under the leadership of the general police authority, consisting of representatives of the police authority, the municipality of Willingen (Upland), the Ski Club Willingen and the International Ski Federation FIS decided on Saturday evening in Willingen (Upland) to cancel the second FIS Ski Jumping World Cup in Willingen (Upland), which was planned for Sunday.

"We have to base our decision on what our sources, which is currently the German Weather Service, are currently providing. I am fully aware of the responsibility I am carrying at this moment. The municipality of Willingen (Upland) will not agree to the opening of the stadium tomorrow," explained Willingen's mayor Thomas Trachte.

"The community has to take care of the well-being of all involved, i.e. the visitors, the athletes and coaches and all helpers. We would take the risk that the people would get into the announced storm on their way home at the latest. The people who are busy with the dismantling of the installations need 6 - 8 hours until everything is dismantled. The safety of the people we are dealing with here is of course more important than anything else," says Trachte.

The cost of the tickets will be refunded minus the advance booking fee, at the place where the ticket was bought.

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