Franz-Josef Rehrl remains Best Jumper with PCR win
Jan 10, 2019·Nordic Combined
Austria’s Franz Josef Rehrl was rightfully wearing the blue bib of the Best Jumper of the field. The 25-year-old won the Provisional Competition Round under the floodlights of Val di Fiemme with a distance of 135.5 metres and a point total of 146.3 points. Should the Provisional Competition Round be taken into account in case of bad weather, Rehrl could start the race together with his teammate Mario Seidl, who achieved a start delay of just one second with a 134.5 metre jump and 146 points.
Akito Watabe continued strong after his two podium results from Otepää (EST) and claimed the third place in the evening’s rankings, showing 133.5 metres. With 143.4 points, his start delay would be 12 seconds. Jumping prodigy Jarl Magnus Riiber ranked only fourth with a starting time of +0:33 seconds after he touched the snow before the fall line following his 135.5 metre jump.
Riiber’s teammate Espen Bjørnstad also continued in strong jumping shape (128.5m; 136.1) and claimed position five, +0:41 seconds behind Rehrl, as did veteran, World and Olympic Champion Johannes Rydzek and newcomer, last weekend’s double Continental Cup winner from Klingenthal, Jens Lurås Oftebro. Both Rydzek and Oftebro achieved a total of 136 points (jumps of 127 and 130.5 m) and would start +0:41 behind Rehrl as well.
Vinzenz Geiger, Szczepan Kupczak and Yoshito Watabe claimed the remaining Top Ten positions. With time behinds of +1:04 and +1:14, last year’s winners Jørgen Graabak and Jan Schmid (NOR) were also still in the game. Fabian Rießle and Eric Frenzel, who returned from a training camp in Seefeld, were a bit further back with positions 19 (+1:38) and 22 (+1:56).
Ten athletes did not qualify for tomorrow’s event, among them local heroes Lukas Runggaldies, who missed rank 50 by 0.7 points, Denis Parolari and Luca Gianmoena, Canada’s Nathaniel Mah and Russians Viacheslav Barkov and Samir Mastiev. Czech Republic’s Lukas Danek was disqualified.
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