Jernej Damjan, Michael Hayboeck, Nejc Dezman - FIS
Two competitions on the famous large hill in Lahti are on the schedule of the men's Continental Cup this weekend. The first event on Friday evening became a duel between Austria and Slovenia.
Michael Hayboeck, winner of the last competition in Rena, was already in the lead after the first round with his jump on 128.5 m. In the final the Austrian then jumped on 125 m, this was enough to earn him the win with a total of 274.4 points.
"I'm happy with my jumping at the moment. We had the possibility to jump here yesterday and I already had a pretty good feeling. Now I'm looking forward to tomorrow's competition and I hope I can be on top of the podium again", said Hayboeck, whose next goal is to participate in the 4-Hills-Tournament.
The 22-year-old was followed by three athletes of Slovenia. Jernej Damjan and his teammate Nejc Dezman shared the third place after the first round. At the end Damjan came in second with 127 m and 131 m (271.3 points), Dezman finished third with 265.5 points (125 m and 124.5 m).
The third-best Slovene was Anze Lanisek. With a strong jump in the final the 17-year-old moved up from ninth to fourth. He was followed by Austrian Manuel Fettner as fifth.
Anssi Koivuranta was the best of the Finnish team in sixth, with Florian Altenburger the seventh place went to Austria again. The outstanding team performance of Slovenia was completed by Robert Hrogta in eighth.
The two best Germans, Daniel Wenig (9th) and Martin Schmitt (10th) also achieved a Top 10 result.
With 260 points Jernej Damjan defended his lead in the overall ranking, close ahead of Michael Hayboeck (250 points) and Manuel Poppinger (134 points).
