Tour blues instead of fun in Zakopane: Ski jumper Pius Paschke experienced a bitter defeat at the first World Cup after the disappointing Four Hills Tournament and missed a second round for the first time in almost a year. The 34-year-old landed in 32nd place in Poland’s party hotspot after a botched 123.5 m jump.
“It’s difficult to understand,” said five-time season winner Pius Paschke on “ARD”, who last failed so early in Sapporo in February 2024. As the best DSV eagle, Karl Geiger came in eighth place following the success of Austria’s tour winner Daniel Tschofenig.
While the German jumpers were still in crisis around five weeks before the World Championships in Trondheim, Tschofenig overtook the Slovenian Anze Lanisek, who was clearly in the lead after the first round, extended his lead in the World Cup and continued the German-Austrian winning streak: 16 individual jumps Jumpers from both countries have won in a row – but most recently the Austrians won seven times.
Geiger confirms upward trend
Behind Tschofenig (316.7 points/136.0+139.5 m), the Norwegian Johann Andre Forfang came second (309.4), and the Austrian Jan Hörl came third (309.3). Lanisek slipped to fourth place. The ÖSV Eagles won the team competition confidently on Saturday, but the Germans also disappointed with fourth place.
Geiger at least confirmed his upward trend, and Andreas Wellinger was also happy with eleventh place. Philipp Raimund at least made it into the second round and came in 21st place.
Behind the four established jumpers, the second row was also disappointing. Constantin Schmid and Felix Hoffmann, who made it into the World Cup team through the Continental Cup, were eliminated in the first round in 41st and 42nd place. The ailing youngster Adrian Tittel had already failed in qualifying on Friday.