2002–03 Four Hills Tournament

The 51st edition of the annual Four Hills Tournament was held in the traditional venues: Oberstorf and Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Germany, and Innsbruck and Bischofshofen in Austria. The defending champion was Sven Hannawald. After being the first ski jumper to win on all four hills in the previous year, he also won the first event of 2003-04. This fifth consecutive victory at a Four Hills tournament equalized a record set by Helmut Recknagel in the late 1950s. Kamil Stoch achieved the same feat in 2018.

Four Hills Tournament
at the 2002-03 FIS Ski Jumping World Cup
VenuesSchattenbergschanze, Große Olympiaschanze, Bergiselschanze, Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze
LocationGermany, Austria
Dates28 December 2002 (2002-12-28) – 6 January 2003 (2003-01-06)
Competitors110 from 20 nations
Medalists
 
 
 

The tournament victor was Janne Ahonen, who had already won the tournament four years prior, and would continue to win it three more times, becoming the most successful athlete of the Four Hills tournament.

Format

At each of the four events, a qualification round was held. The 50 best jumpers qualified for the competition. The fifteen athletes leading the World Cup at the time qualified automatically. In case of an omitted qualification or a result that would normally result in elimination, they would instead qualify as 50th.

Unlike the procedure at normal World Cup events, the 50 qualified athletes were paired up for the first round of the final event, with the winner proceeding to the second round. The rounds start with the duel between #26 and #25 from the qualification round, followed by #27 vs #24, up to #50 vs #1. The five best duel losers, so-called 'Lucky Losers' also proceed.

For the tournament ranking, the total points earned from each jump are added together. The World Cup points collected during the four events are disregarded in this ranking.

Pre-Tournament World Cup Standings

At the time of the tournament, eight out of twenty-eight events were already held.

The standings were as follows:[1]

RankNamePoints
01. Martin Höllwarth469
02. Janne Ahonen427
03. Andreas Widhölzl405
04. Sigurd Pettersen396
05. Adam Małysz381
06. Michael Uhrmann320
07. Andreas Goldberger279
08. Primož Peterka278
09. Sven Hannawald224
10. Andreas Kofler220
Peter Žonta220

Participating nations and athletes

The number of jumpers a nation was allowed to nominate was dependent on previous results. At each event, a 'national group' of ten jumpers from the host country was added.

The defending champion was Sven Hannawald. Six other competitors had also previously won the Four Hills tournament: Andreas Goldberger in 1992-93 and 1994–95, Primož Peterka in 1996-97, Kazuyoshi Funaki in 1997-98, Janne Ahonen in 1998-99, Andreas Widhölzl in 1999-00 and Adam Małysz in 2000-01.

The following athletes were nominated:

NationStarting SpotsNumber of AthletesAthletes
 Germany8+1019Michael Uhrmann, Sven Hannawald, Georg Spaeth, Martin Schmitt, Christof Duffner, Stefan Pieper, Maximilian Mechler, Michael Neumayer (not in Innsbruck), Stephan Hocke (until Innsbruck)
National Group: Alexander Herr, Jörg Ritzerfeld, Kai Bracht, Michael Möllinger, Dirk Else, Ferdinand Bader, Frank Ludwig, Daniel Klausmann, Frank Reichel (Oberstdorf only), Roland Audenrieth (Garmisch-Partenkirchen only)
 Austria8 + 1020Martin Höllwarth, Andreas Widhölzl, Andreas Goldberger, Andreas Kofler, Florian Liegl, Mathias Hafele, Thomas Morgenstern, Martin Koch (until Innsbruck)
National Group: Reinhard Schwarzenberger, Wolfgang Loitzl, Stefan Thurnbichler, Christian Nagiller, Bastian Kaltenböck, Balthasar Schneider, Bernhard Metzler, Stefan Kaiser, Manuel Fettner, Markus Eigentler (Innsbruck only), Stefan Becker (Bischofshofen only), Michael Nagiller (Bischofshofen only)
 Bulgaria11Georgi Zharkov
 Czech Republic34Jakub Janda, Jan Matura, Lukáš Hlava (until Garmisch-Partenkirchen), Jiří Parma (Innsbruck onward)
 Estonia33Jens Salumäe, Jaan Jüris (not Innsbruck), Jouko Hein (Garmisch-Partenkirchen only)
 Finland88Janne Ahonen, Arttu Lappi, Matti Hautamäki, Tami Kiuru, Akseli Kokkonen, Veli-Matti Lindström, Jussi Hautamäki, Risto Jussilainen
 France33Nicolas Dessum (Innsbruck onward, Emmanuel Chedal (Innsbruck onward, Maxime Remy (Innsbruck only)
 Italy33Roberto Cecon, Alessio Bolgnani, Giancarlo Adami
 Japan55Noriaki Kasai, Kazuyoshi Funaki, Hideharu Miyahira, Hiroki Yamada, Kazuya Yoshioka
 Kazakhstan33Pawel Gaiduk, Stanislav Filimonov, Maxim Polunin
 Netherlands22Ingemar Mayr, Christoph Kreuzer (Innsbruck onward)
 Norway88Sigurd Pettersen, Roar Ljøkelsøy, Bjørn Einar Romøren, Kim-Roar Hansen, Henning Stensrud, Lars Bystøl, Tommy Ingebrigtsen, Anders Bardal
 Poland45Adam Małysz, Marcin Bachleda, Tomasz Pochwała, Tomisław Tajner (until Garmisch-Partenkirchen), Robert Mateja (Bischofshofen only)
 Russia45Valery Kobelev, Ildar Fatchullin, Ilya Rosliakov, Alexei Silaev (until Innsbruck), Dmitri Vassiliev (Bischofshofen only)
 Slovakia22Martin Mesík, Dušan Oršula
 Slovenia66Primož Peterka, Peter Žonta, Damjan Fras, Robert Kranjec, Igor Medved, Rok Benkovič (Innsbruck onward)
 South Korea44Kim Hyun-ki, Kang Chil-ku, Choi Yong-jik (until Innsbruck), Choi Heung-chul (until Innsbruck)
 Sweden22Kristoffer Jåfs, Isak Grimholm
  Switzerland44Simon Ammann, Andreas Küttel, Marco Steinauer (until Innsbruck), Sylvain Freiholz (Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Innsbruck)
 United States33Alan Alborn, Clint Jones (until Garmisch-Partenkirchen), Tommy Schwall (until Garmisch-Partenkirchen)

Results

Oberstorf

Schattenbergschanze, Oberstorf
28-29 December 2002

Qualification winner: Roar Ljøkelsøy

RankNamePoints
1 Sven Hannawald263.1
2 Martin Höllwarth257.7
3 Janne Ahonen257.5
4 Martin Schmitt252.5
5 Andreas Kofler245.1
6 Roar Ljøkelsøy243.6
7 Primož Peterka239.7
8 Peter Žonta239.0
9 Thomas Morgenstern237.4
10 Florian Liegl236.8

Garmisch-Partenkirchen

Große Olympiaschanze, Garmisch-Partenkirchen
31 December 2002 - 1 January 2003

The second event saw three former tournament winners on the podium, two of which have not even placed in the Top Ten in Oberstorf. The first event's winner Sven Hannawald on the other hand, only placed 12th (235.1p).

Qualification winner: Thomas Morgenstern

RankNamePoints
1 Primož Peterka264.6
2 Andreas Goldberger261.1
Adam Małysz261.1
4 Roar Ljøkelsøy256.1
5 Janne Ahonen255.6
6 Simon Ammann247.9
7 Hideharu Miyahira245.9
8 Andreas Kofler245.5
9 Andreas Widhölzl239.8
10 Martin Höllwarth236.9

Innsbruck

Bergiselschanze, Innsbruck
03-4 January 2003

The jumbled results of the first two events saw Janne Ahonen in the lead after the tournament's first half. With a clear victory in Innsbruck, the Finn increased his lead in the overall ranking to 26.7 points.

Again, the winner of the previous event could not be found in the Top Ten. Peterka placed 15th (198.1p).

Qualification winner: Stefan Thurnbichler

RankNamePoints
1 Janne Ahonen227.5
2 Florian Liegl218.7
3 Martin Höllwarth216.6
4 Sven Hannawald215.7
5 Andreas Widhölzl214.4
6 Adam Małysz211.9
7 Roar Ljøkelsøy210.6
8 Andreas Goldberger208.4
9 Martin Schmitt206.9
10 Andreas Kofler204.6

Bischofshofen

Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze, Bischofshofen
6 January 2003

Due to bad weather, the qualification was postponed to January 6, and instead of Sudden Death match-ups in the first round, the usual World Cup format was used.

The surprise winner was 21-year-old Bjørn Einar Romøren, whose best position during the tournament so far had been a 15th place in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. It was his first World Cup victory.

Janne Ahonen performed two solid jumps and his comfortable lead in the overall ranking was not in danger.

Qualification winner: Thomas Morgenstern

RankNamePoints
1 Bjørn Einar Romøren263.1
2 Sven Hannawald262.4
Andreas Kofler262.4
4 Janne Ahonen259.3
5 Sigurd Pettersen257.0
6 Thomas Morgenstern255.5
7 Adam Małysz253.0
8 Primož Peterka252.3
9 Florian Liegl250.5
10 Roberto Cecon248.1

Final Ranking

RankNameOberstorfGarmisch-PartenkirchenInnsbruckBischofshofenPoints
1 Janne Ahonen3rd5th1st4th999.9
2 Sven Hannawald1st12th4th2nd976.3
3 Adam Małysz13th2nd6th7th959.7
4 Andreas Kofler5th8th10th2nd957.6
5 Primož Peterka7th1st15th8th954.7
6 Roar Ljøkelsøy6th4th7th15th949.3
7 Martin Höllwarth2nd10th3rd16th945.6
8 Florian Liegl10th17th2nd9th934.2
9 Andreas Goldberger14th2nd8th22nd923.0
10 Thomas Morgenstern9th25th12th6th912.8

The winner of Bischofshofen, Bjørn Einar Romøren, had failed to proceed to the second round of Oberstorf and only placed 19th overall (801.4p).

References

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