Hisaki Nagamine wins PCR at World Cup debut

Japanese youngster Hisaki Nagamine had a great day at his first World Cup start in Sapporo. The 19-year-old won the PCR in his home country with the longest jump of the day: 134 metres. 120.1 points put him four seconds ahead of Austrian veteran Willi Denifl should the PCR have to be used instead of the Friday or Saturday jumping event.

Denifl had 131 metres to show for (119 p.), Japanese superstar Akito Watabe followed with 128 metres (115.2 p.) which would give him 20 seconds to make up on the track. German veteran Björn Kircheisen also had a very good jump of 130.5 metres but fell shortly after landing and therefore ended up on the 22nd rank only.

Håvard Klemetsen and Tim Hug had 128 metres and Lukas Klapfer even 128.5 metres up his sleeve which gave them positions four to six and starting times between +0:38 and +0:50. All other starters would be content with time delays of over one minute at the start going up to 4:57 seconds for German Junior World Championship medallist Martin Hahn on rank 40. As less than 50 starters are in Sapporo, today’s PCR did not act as a qualification and all athletes, including the disqualified Jasper Good, Ernest Yahin, Harald Riiber and Yoshito Watabe are able to start in the competitions as long as the PCR is not needed.