Vikersund 1990

With the yearly skijumping season coming to an end this weekend in Planica with the world championship in skiflying, I thought it would be a good idea to go back to the first flying world championship of the 90es. Welcome to Vikersund (Norway) and the flying competition on Vikersundbakken. In quite difficult conditions at times, the competition was really open, as at that time, there was a rule, every jumper had 3 tries and the best 2 were counted and lead to the world champion. Vikersund had in retrospect many interesting points:
The winner of the competition was Dieter Thoma (Germany), who had previously won the 4-Hill-Tournament, so his victory wasn't the biggest surprise. Silvermedal went to the legendary Matti Nykaenen, who won medals in all 5 skiflying world championships he took part in (from 1983 - 1990), making him the most successful athlete in skiflying up to his day. It was the last medal he won + his last Top 3 position in a competition. Third place went to Jens Weissflog (his last medal for German Democratic Republic), who missed silver by just 1.5 points (in distance, a good meter in 2 jumps). Thoma and Nykaenen both managed to fly 171m in one round, which at that time was the hill record on Vikersundbakken.

And to get back into today's life, it should be noted, that Japanese Noriaki Kasai already took part in the competition 1990 - he'll be a competitor tomorrow in Planica again, which is enormous - 20 years... Miran Tepes, who finished 15th in Vikersund, works for the FIS as assistant race director in all World Cup Skijumping competitions.
Both, Weissflog (ZDF) and Thoma (ARD), work as skijumping experts for German TV.