WARSAW, Jan. 26 -- Germany won the team competition at ski jumping FIS World Cup in Zakopane on Saturday while the Japanese Sato Yukiya set a new record of the hill with 147 meters.
The German quartet of Constantin Schmid, Markus Eisenbichler, Stephen Leyhe and Karl Geiger beat the Norwegian foursome of Marius Lindvik, Robert Johansson, Daniel Andre Tande and Johann Andre Forfang for the top honor.
Norway was in front after three jumps before Forfang jumped on 122.5 meters, while Geiger made 133 meters to put his team in front before the second round with 20.1 points advantage.
The battle for the podium was very close as the third Slovenians had just 1.4 points more than Austria after the four jumps.
In the second round, Germany controlled the situation to take the first place followed by Norway and Slovenia. The hosts failed to meet the expectations as the Poles took fifth place ahead of 10 thousand home crowd.
"I don't want to talk about individual jumps, because we are a team and we have four jumpers. We fought to the end, but we didn't manage to stand on the podium. We win and lose together. I would like to praise Dawid Kubacki, who is in his best shape. He showed quality. The Polish ski jumpers have high skills and I hope they will show that in the individual competition," Poland coach Michal Dolezal was quoted as saying by the local media.
Sato set the record of 147 meters in the second round to beat Dawid Kubacki's result of 143.5 meters from the previous year, leading Japan to the fourth place. 2.5 points less than the third-placed Slovenia.
The individual competition is scheduled for Sunday. Enditem