SKI JUMPING. Coach Goran Janus cried tears of joy, Robert Kranjec, dressed up as an eagle, sang the Slovenian national anthem together with Anze Lanisek, the uncrowned king of Slovenia, Peter Prevc, and the incredible crowd at the flying hill in Planica. The big final of the FIS Ski Jumping World Cup in Planica lived up to its promise. And Peter Prevc made a gift to himself and all of Slovenia with his 15th win this season.

After the new champion landed his final jump with a perfect telemark on 241.5 m, the judges gave him three times 20.0 and Peter Prevc took his 15th win ahead of his teammate Robert Kranjec and Johann Andre Forfang with 435.0 points, the crowd went wild.

Perfect Slovenian final

The final in Planica couldn't have gone any better for the hosts. A year after Jurij Tepes' win prevent the overall title for Prevc, the 4-Hills-Tournament winner, Ski Flying World Champion, Ski Flying World Cup winner and overall World Cup winner proved his skills again and left no doubt about his dominance. Prevc was already in the lead after his first jump on 238 m. "It was a phenomenal season and it will be very hard to repeat it", said Prevc.

Robert Kranjec, who secured the second Slovenian double victory this weekend with jumps on 234 m and 233 m and 420.4 points, proved to be the leader of the party when the whole Slovenian team, including their female colleagues, formed a guard of honor. The icing on the cake today was that the team of Goran Janus could also celebrate the second place in the Nation's Cup - ahead of defending champion Germany. "I'm very satisfied with this weekend. A win and second and third places are very, very good results. It was a great season for Peter, it can't be any better", Robert Kranjec said afterwards.

Forfang leads Norwegians

This year's Nation's Cup title went to Norway already some time ago. In the final Johann Andre Forfang represented the outstanding team on the podium. 226 m and the longest jump of the day on 245 m earned Forfang the third place with 405.4 points. "It was a great season. We achieved more than we expected before. Today I'm really happy that I could end the season with a new personal best of 245 m. The final jump today was actually the first jump where I did what I was supposed to do and I figured out the inrun", Forfang told.

Another star of the season closely missed the podium: Noriaki Kasai, who had his 500th World Cup appearance in Planica on Thursday, came in 1.2 points behind Forfang with 227 m and 231.5 m. Behind Kasai, Kenneth Gangnes completed the Slovenian-Norwegian-Japanese festival in fifth. Austria and Germany, who had the leading athletes in most of the recent years, weren't in the spotlight on Sunday. Michael Hayboeck lost the fight for the third place in the overall World Cup to Kenneth Gangnes and finished sixth in the final event. Severin Freund had already secured the second place in the overall World Cup before today, but still he will probably not be satisfied with his seventh place in Planica and with the third place in the Nation's Cup.

Ammann celebrates

Simon Ammann had a reason to celebrate. 238.5 m with a typical "Amman-landing" and judges' marks of up to 16.5 earned the four-time Olympic champion the eighth place and the fans saw a very happy Swiss. World record holder Anders Fannemel came in ninth and secured the tenth place in the overall World Cup - he is the fourth Norwegian in the Top 10. Stefan Kraft ended the season on a solid tenth place. While Richard Freitag missed the podium result he had hoped for in the final jump and finished 11th, Daniel Andre Tande was maybe already thinking about the party afterwards and so his mood was not spoiled by a 12th place. Jurij Tepes didn't want to spoil the fun again and finished 13th, ahead of 30-year-old Japanese youngster Daiki Ito.

Last competition for Kruczek as Polish coach

In his final competition as Polish head coach Lukasz Kruczek didn't experience anything new: Maciej Kot the best of his team in 15th, followed by Andreas Stjernen, Taku Takeuchi and Roman Koudelka. Kamil Stoch was 21st and what remains for him at the end of the season are the memories of better times. Vincent Descombes Sevoie was 20th and will probably start the vacation in a happy mood after he set a new personal record for World Cup points and ends the season on the 28th place in the overall World Cup. 7202 - That's the impressive number of points with which Norway won the Nation's Cup, followed by Slovenia (5760 points) and Germany (5409 points).

Prevc breaks records

But the figure of the year will be 2303. This is the new record for World Cup points with which Peter Prevc pulverized the old record of Gregor Schlierenzauer. Prevc won 15 of 29 individual competitions - also a record. Probably nobody has ever deserved an overall World Cup title more. Severin Freund (1490 points) and Kenneth Gangnes (1348 points) finished second and third.

FIS ski jumping
20 March 2016 12:24

  Tweet