Kobayashi is Beijing’s king of the hill

Ryoyu Kobayashi has won Olympic ski jumping gold on the normal hill on Sunday, becoming the first Japanese to win the event since Yukio Kasaya in 1972.

“Nothing special I was thinking about before, but I am so happy right now,” the 25-year-old Kobayashi said through an interpreter after his victory on Sunday night.

Kobayashi is only the third jumper from outside Europe to win gold in an individual ski jumping competition, an event that has been in the Winter Olympics since the first edition in 1924.

The other two are Kasaya and another Japanese jumper, Kazuyoshi Funaki, who earned gold on the large hill at the 2018 Olympics.

Kobayashi jumped last and best, clearing 99.5 metres and had 129.6 points thanks to his graceful style from start to finish.

Manuel Fettner, of Austria, won the silver and Dawid Kubacki, of Poland, the bronze.

Four years ago in South Korea, Kobayashi finished seventh on the normal hill and sixth on the large hill but entered the Beijing Games as one of the favourites as the second-ranked jumper in the world.

“I had only good feelings when I was performing,” he said. “At the last Olympics, I realised many things that I was missing so this time I did what I had to do. This is why I got the victory.”

Two-time ski jumping gold medallist Andreas Wellinger is missing from the Beijing Games because he tested positive for COVID-19 last week.

Karl Geiger of Germany came to China as the No.1 jumper in the World Cup standings but he could only finish 15th.

“I’m not quite sure what exactly happened and why,” he said.

After the first round, Turkish ski jumper Fatih Arda Ipcioglu had refused to say if the crescent and star on his blue skis was a statement in support of China’s Uyghur community.

The design on the skis used on Saturday seemingly represented East Turkestan, the region home to Uyghurs.

“I don’t want to answer about those questions,” Ipcioglu said on Sunday, after finishing 36th in the 50-jumper field.