Four Hills Tournament

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The Four Hills Tournament (German: Vierschanzentournee) is composed of four Ski Jumping World Cup events and has taken place in Germany and Austria each year since 1952. The tournament is third only to the World Cup and the Winter Olympics as the most sought-after title on the ski jumping world circuit.

The Four Hills Tournament champion is the one who gets the most points over the four events. Unlike the World Cup ranking, however, the actual points scored during the competitions are the ones that are used to find the winner.

The four individual events themselves are part of the World Cup and award points toward the world cup in exactly the same manner as all other world cup events.

Contents 1 Tournament hills 2 Knock-out system 3 Previous winners 4 Records 5 National quota 6 See also 7 External links

[edit] Tournament hills

Date	Image	Place	Hill name	K-Point	Hill size	Hill record
30 December		Oberstdorf, Germany	Schattenbergschanze	K-120	HS 137	143.5 m (2003) Sigurd Pettersen, Norway
1 January		Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany	Große Olympiaschanze	K-125	HS 140	141.0 m (2008) Gregor Schlierenzauer, Austria
4 January		Innsbruck, Austria	Bergiselschanze	K-120	HS 130	136.0 m (2004) Adam Małysz, Poland
6 January		Bischofshofen, Austria	Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze	K-125	HS 140	143.0 m (2005) Daiki Ito, Japan

[edit] Knock-out system

One of the tournament's particularities is its controversial qualifying system. Unlike the other ski jumping events where the best 30 competitors of the first series qualify into the second series, all four tournament's events follow the so called knock-out system, first introduced in the 1996–97 season. 50 first series competitors are divided into 25 pairs. All 25 winners of those internal "duels" plus five best "lucky losers" qualify into the second series. This way, it is theoretically possible that a competitor with the 12^th first series result does not qualify into the second series (if he loses his internal duel, five lucky losers and winners of their duels have better results) while the one with the 49^th first series result may still qualify (if his "rival" has the worst result). However, in this competition format, qualifying series are also valued, since jumper with better qualification result will compete against jumper with worse result. Therefore, it is not enough for a jumper to be among 50 best jumpers in qualifications (with whatever result), but it is better for him to achieve as good result as possible.

If qualification is postponed until the day of competition, knock-out system is not used, and competition follows regular world cup rules. Because of that in 2007/08 tournament, knock-out system was used only in Oberstdorf.

[edit] Previous winners

[edit] Records

Janne Ahonen is the only ski jumper to have won the tournament five times, with wins in 1998–99, 2002–03, 2004–05, 2005–06 and 2007/08. Jens Weissflog was the first ski jumper to reach four wins. He won the tournament in 1984, 1985, 1991 and 1996. The next in number of wins are Helmut Recknagel and Bjørn Wirkola with three titles each. Wirkola's victories came in three consecutive years (1967–1969), a record still uncontested.

The fourth victory of Janne Ahonen in 2005–06 was also the first time the tournament victory was tied between two competitors, with Jakub Janda sharing the title by obtaining his first 4 Hills Tournament success.

Jens Weissflog and Bjørn Wirkola have both won ten individual competitions within the Four Hills Tournament. Janne Ahonen is next with 9 victories, followed by Matti Nykänen who has seven.

During the 49th edition of the tournament (2000–01) Adam Małysz had advantage of 104.4 points to the second competitor in the Tournament Janne Ahonen which is the biggest advantage in the tournament's history. He has also won all four qualifications that year. During the 50th edition of the tournament (2001–02), Sven Hannawald became first, and so far only, person to win all four competitions in a single year.

Germany has the most victories with sixteen (eleven of which were pre-1989), next comes Finland with 15 victories and then Norway with ten wins and Austria with nine. Czechoslovakia and one of its successors the Czech Republic have two wins altogether; the following countries all have a single victory: Japan, Slovenia, Poland and the USSR.

[edit] National quota

During the Four Hills Tournament many national jumpers from Germany and Austria are allowed to qualify for the competition. This allows them to show themselves and get experience. The national jumping team starts first in the qualification.

[edit] See also

• Nordic Tournament

[edit] External links

• http://www.vierschanzen.org (German)
• http://www.home.no/hanslysaker/hopukvin.htm

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