Sara Marita Kramer flying in Russia
Mar 25, 2021·Ski Jumping
600 kilometers west from Nizhny Tagil, the Blue Bird, the Russian end-of-season women's ski jumping tour started again on Thursday morning in Chaikovsky with qualification.
Austrian Marita Kramer, double winner last weekend and Blue Bird leader, clearly dominated with the longest jump, 98.5 meters, scoring 119.3 points. Slovenian Nika Kriznar, current overall World Cup leader, followed 13.9 points behind with 105.4 points and 89 m. Norwegian Silje Opseth came just after with 104.8 points and 92 m.
Sara Takanashi, with whom Kriznar is fighting for the Crystal Globe till Sunday, was only eighth. Surprisingly, the best Japanese was Nozomi Maruyama, who is having her best career result in this Russian tour. She finished fourth in Thursday's qualification and reached fifth position last week in Nizhny Tagil.
Another surprise came from Anna Rupprecht, finishing fifth in the qualification. This is her best result so far in individual competition, but keeping in mind that she was just crowned World Champion with the mixed team competition in Oberstdorf. She was also the best German, her teammate Katharina Althaus finishing 11th.
With Kramer so strong, even with 660 points, the overall ranking is announced thrilling till final competition on Sunday. So far Kriznar has 751 points and Sara Takanashi 746.
The first individual competition in Chaikovsky, and the third from Blue Bird Tour, starts on Friday at 13.00 CET, 17.00 LOC. A team competition follows on Saturday and the final, overall World Cup and Blue Bird Tour, is on Sunday.
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