COC-M/W: Norway remains undefeated on home ground in Rena
Jan 26, 2020·Nordic Combined
After having been on the podium several times this season, a strong ski jumping performance brought Lars Ivar Skaarset (NOR) his very first Continental Cup win today.
In men’s competition, the Norwegian team was once again unbeatable on the skijumping hill. This time it was Lars Ivar Skaarset, who took the lead with the longest jump of the day (107 metres, 136 p.), followed by his teammate Sindre Ure Soetvik (105.5 metres, 133.9 p.) 8 seconds behind. Just like the day before third place went to Christian Deuschl (102.5 metres, 125.7 p.) 41 seconds behind. Simen Tiller (104.5 metres, 125.5 p.), Simon Hüttel (102.5 metres, 123.9 p.) and Marius Solvik (101.5 metres, 119.9 p.) followed on ranks four, five and six.
After yesterday’s misfortune, Skaarset was highly motivated to show a better performance in cross-country skiing this time. After Soetvik had closed the gap between him and Skaarset by the end of the first lap, Skaarset increased the speed a bit more to shake off his teammate again. While the young Norwegian was doing his laps all alone after that, what happened behind him, promised to be a great finish.
Lars Buraas, who had been 39th after the jumping part with a disadvantage of 2:12 minutes, made up position by position. None of his opponents was able to keep up with him and his outstanding cross-country performance and they all had to let him pass by. In the end, he celebrated an impressive second place behind Skaarset. Third place went to Andreas Skoglund, fourth was Paul Gerstgraser, followed by Sindre Ure Soetvik and Marius Solvik on rank five and six.
Justin Moczarski, Jakob Eiksund Saethre, Manuel Maierhofer and Gael Blondeau completed the top ten.
Marte Leinan Lund impressed with a very strong cross-country performance and celebrated her second Continental Cup win in Rena today.
A jump on 99.5 metres (112.4 p.) brought Austria’s youngster Sigrun Kleinrath in the lead after today’s jumping round, 7 seconds ahead of Glafira Noskova (96 metres, 110.6 p.) and 10 seconds ahead of Veronica Gianmoena (96 metres, 109.8 p.). The longest jump of the day went to Alexandra Glazunova from Russia, who landed on 100 metres, jumping with a bit better wind conditions than the other women (109.6 p.). Also for Stefaniya Nadymova (97 metres, 109.1 p.) and Marte Leinan Lund (99 metres, 108.7 p.) the podium was still reachable.
With six girls within 15 seconds the cross-country race promised to be an exciting one. While Leinan Lund was able to close the gap between herself and Kleinrath and Glazunova with a very strong performance already by the end of the first lap, the other women were not quite able to keep up with her.
It did not take very long until Leinan Lund took the lead and was able to shake off the Austrian and the Russian. In the end she celebrated a clear victory and took over the green bib for the overall Continental Cup leader, as leader Tara Geraghty-Moats could not compete the weekend due to illness.
Russia's Glazunova was a bit stronger than the Austrian Kleinrath on the track and reached the second place again. The fight for the third spot on the podium was a close one. Veronica Gianmoena was able to close the gap between her and Kleinrath with an impressive performance on the last lap. However, this cost her so much energy that she lost the finish sprint against the young Austrian, who was very happy about her third place.
Rank five went to Stefaniya Nadymova. Sixth was Leinan Lund’s sister Mari. The fastest cross-country time went to Anastasia Goncharova, who ended up on a solid 11th place.
