Simen Tiller wins first Continental Cup event in Klingenthal
Klingenthal presented itself as a perfect winter wonderland on the first day of the Continental Cup weekend, if only there had been no wind. After one trial round and the Provisional Competition Round on Friday morning, the competition round for the Individual Gundersen 5km had to be interrupted over and over again until the jury decided that jumping wasn’t possible anymore and PCR had to be used.
Norway’s Simen Tiller was the lucky jumping round winner with a jump to 139.0m (137.5p.), which brought him an advantage of 26 seconds ahead of his teammate Espen Andersen (133.0m, 131.0p.) and Austria’s Christian Deuschl (130.0m, 131.0p.). Fourth place after jumping went to Austria’s Philipp Orter (134.0m, 130.1p.), fifth was Szczepan Kupczak (132.5m, 126.4p.), on rank six followed Lars Ivar Skaarset (133.0m, 125.4p.).
It was a thrilling neck-and-neck race between Julian Schmid and Jakob Lange this past Sunday afternoon at the FIS Nordic Combined Continental Cup in Park City/Utah. The two Germans were fighting for the win until the very last meters. In the end it was Schmid, who crossed the finish line 0.1 seconds ahead of his teammate.
Reason enough to name both of them “Athlete of the week” this time.
Lange, who had won all three events in Park City / Soldier Hollow last season, was able to continue his winning stroke in the first competition 2020/21 on Friday. With an outstanding cross-country performance, he was able to close the 58-seconds-gap to the leader already in the first lap and left no doubt that he would be the man to beat this weekend.