After a difficult time, Andreas Wellinger is slowly finding his top form again and ensures the best German result in ski jumping in Engelberg. Karl Geiger, on the other hand, is visibly dissatisfied shortly before the Four Hills Tournament.
Karl Geiger angrily clapped both hands on his thighs and shook his head with a frosty expression: In the bitterly cold Engelberg, Germany’s ski jumping star did not make the breakthrough he had hoped for twelve days before the start of the Four Hills Tournament. While Olympic champion Andreas Wellinger provided the German ray of hope with sixth place in part one of the dress rehearsal in Switzerland, Geiger is still a bit apart from the world’s best.
“I notice that I’m not that far away. But I just can’t get it on the ski jump,” the Oberstdorf native complained after his 22nd place and a shaky second jump: “I saved it, but it stinks to me that I didn’t catch the table.” While the very best jumpers around the Slovenian day winner Anze Lanisek and Poland’s second-placed World Cup leader Dawid Kubacki seem to be the biggest tour favorites, the Olympic third-placed violinist does not look like an attack on the gold eagle.
“It’s sometimes better, sometimes worse. You can’t let yourself be brought down,” said Geiger, who actually likes Engelberg’s Gross-Titlis-Schanze: In 2018 the Allgäu native celebrated his first career victory here, last year the last success of a German.
Despite his best result of the season and a remarkable increase in performance, Wellinger was far away from that, which did not spoil his joy. “We’ve taken the right path. But I’m surprised that things are getting better so quickly,” said the 27-year-old from Ruhpolding, and above all he celebrated his second flight at 139.0 meters: “It was just awesome.”
With 295.1 points, Wellinger was about ten meters behind third place. Lanisek (320.3) won with jumps on 139.5 and 142.0 meters ahead of Kubacki (317.0) – both now have three wins of the season under their belt. Third place went to normal hill world champion Piotr Zyla (Poland/312.3). Experienced Pius Paschke took eleventh place as the second best German. Stephan Leyhe was 17th. The six-time world champion Markus Eisenbichler was 27th.
“Of course I’m not satisfied with that,” said Eisenbichler, “but I have to take it as it is. It was a small step in the right direction. I have to see the positive side and not always say: I can do more. ” They can only show once again that Eisenbichler and especially Geiger can do more: On Sunday (12.30 p.m. / ARD and Eurosport) the last competition before the start of the tour on December 29th in Oberstdorf will take place in Engelberg.