Outstanding performance of Halvor Egner Granerud
Jan 31, 2021·Ski JumpingWith an impressive performance, Halvor Egner Granerud won the second Ski Jumping World Cup competition in Willingen on Sunday. After only one round, Granerud claimed a clear win ahead of Poland's Piotr Zyla and Markus Eisenbichler of Germany.
The winner of Sunday's competition and the overall title of the Willingen/6 were determined after only one round. Due to the difficult wind conditions, this one round had to be interrupted various times and took about two hours to complete, longer than a usual competition with two rounds.
Yesterday's winner and overall World Cup leader Halvor Egner Granerud of Norway was utterly unaffected by the conditions today. With his great jump, he managed to earn a lead of 19.3 points in only one round. "The conditions were not that bad for me today, I could stay in the warm-up room longer and wait for my jump there, others had to wait in the cold for a long time and it was a lot tougher for them. I'm in great shape at the moment. Looks like I managed to get back in the mood that I had before Christmas - just to jump and have fun. The World Cup is definitely not over, but it feels good to extend my lead over the others", said the happy winner.
With his third place today, Markus Eisenbichler could move up to third in the overall ranking of the Willingen/6. "I was lucky with the wind conditions and now I'm very happy that I could be on the podium today. With conditions like that it can go either way", said Eisenbichler.
The surprise of the day was Klemens Muranka in fourth. The Pole, who holds the hill record in Willingen since Friday, confirmed today that he can jump really well on the Muehlenkopfhill in Willingen. Pius Paschke finished in a strong eighth place.
After finishing 12th yesterday, Simon Ammann was ninth today, a very strong performance by the 4-time Olympic champion after his long drought.
Stefan Kraft and Daniel Huber came in sixth and seventh today after they were struggling with the conditions in Saturday's competition. Stefan Kraft told after the event: "It was extremely difficult today and I didn't expect that the jury would carry out the competition, although it was far from fair. But still, you have to say that the best were in the Top 3 again today. In such conditions, you have to attack and I was able to do that today. I'm definitely very satisfied with my jump."
The World Cup continues next weekend with two competitions in Klingenthal. As always, they can be followed in our Ski Jumping Live-Ticker.