Austria wins gold in 1st Olympic men’s super team ski jump as event is shortened due to weather

PREDAZZO, Italy (AP) - A disappointing Olympics for Austria's ski jumpers turned to gold Monday on the final night of competition in the debut of the men's super team ski jump at the Milan Cortina Games.

Jan Hoerl and Olympic rookie Stephan Embacher led through the event before a snow squall forced the cancellation of the final round of the event.

Poland took silver and Norway won bronze.

The result was redemption for Austria, which won the men's team event in Beijing in 2022, but had not reached the podium in this Olympics.

"The last 10 days were hard for our team so it was the last chance today," said Hoerl, who was part of the 2022 winning team. "We knew that, so we kept focused and we were able to enjoy five good jumps. It's amazing, unbelievable."

Hoerl's best individual finish had been a fifth on the men's large hill and Embacher's had been a pair of seventh place finishes on each hill. Both had also been on the mixed team that finished fifth.

The new format replaced the former four-man team contest on the large hill with teams of two. Seventeen nations jumped in the first round and the top 12 made the second round. The best eight moved on to the final.

But as heavy snow and wind held up competition with only a few skiers left to make their final jump, the round was canceled and the second round standings determined the winners.

Sandro Pertile, race director for the international ski federation, said the heavy, wet snow was slowing speeds on the in-run and the shift in winds was going to create unfair conditions for the remaining competitors.

Hoerl opened with a 137.5-meter (451-foot) jump and Embacher in the second round landed a 139-meter (456-foot) jump, the longest in the contest.

"My first time and to be Olympic champion is unbelievable," Embacher said. "It was a great day."

Austria led Slovenia, Poland, Germany and Japan after the first round. Poland moved into second and Norway into third as Slovenia slid into fifth place after the second round.

The result delivered a third medal for Poland's Kacper Tomasiak, a rookie in his first year on the World Cup circuit, who has been the surprise of men's Olympic ski jumping, winning a silver on the normal hill and a bronze on the large hill. He was paired with Pawel Wasek, whose best Olympic finish had been sixth in a team event in 2022.

"We are very happy, but I think we still can't believe that it happened," Tomasiak said.

Norway's Johann André Forfang, who had won gold on the large hill and silver on the normal hill in Pyeongchang in 2018 but had not had a good Olympics before Monday was paired with Kristoffer Eriksen Sundal, who won silver in the mixed team event.

Forfang was suspended last year in a jumpsuit-tampering scandal that brought shame to the country that invented the sport.

Forfang and teammate Marius Lindvik were suspended for three months last year after their coaches and a staff member were caught on camera adding stitching to stiffen the crotch area to help the athletes fly farther.

Neither Lindvik nor Forfang was charged with knowing about the manipulation, but FIS said they "should have checked and asked questions about the nighttime adjustments."

The team leaders involved were recently banned from the sport for 18 months.

Going into the final round, only a few points separated Germany, Slovenia and Japan from a medal.

Japan's Ren Nikaido, who has won a medal in every ski jump at this Olympics, landed a third jump of 138 meters, which could have put Japan on the podium had the final round not been canceled before Ryoyu Kobayashi's final jump.

Slovenia's Domen Prevc, the dominant skier this season, was one of the few jumpers to fly in the heavy snow, with a poor result of 124.5 meters.

Germany's Philipp Raimund, who won gold on the normal hill, then flew 136 meters through the snow, putting his country in the lead with four jumpers - all with higher second-round scores - remaining.

Tomasiak was the last skier to fly through the flakes, coming up short and putting Poland in third behind Slovenia.

Norway, Japan and Austria's final skiers were left at the top of the hill when the event was ended.

Raimund said it was sad ending up in fourth place.

The result meant Prevc could not add to the gold medals he won on the men's large hill and in the mixed team competition in his first Olympics - or to his family's famous collection. He blamed his team's finish on the poor landing of his second jump.

"It was almost third place, but overall it is a bit sour for me," Prevc said. "Unfortunately, we have to take this as it is."

He said canceling the round, though, was the right decision.

The U.S. team of Kevin Bickner and Tate Frantz made it to the final round but ended up in eighth place.