(Reuters) – Holder Kamil Stoch became the second man to win all four legs of the Four Hills competition as he retained the title with victory at Bischofshofen on Saturday.
The 30-year-old Pole, who won the first three stages at Oberstdorf, Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Innsbruck, jumped 132.5 and 137 meters across the two rounds to equal German Sven Hannawald’s record set in 2002.
Stoch, a double gold medalist at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, finished with a tally of 275.6 points and his victory took him past German Richard Freitag in the overall World Cup standings.
Norway’s Anders Fannemel finished second on 272.4 points after a massive 139-metre leap in the final round followed by German Andreas Wellinger, who rounded out the podium after recording 270.5 points.
Wellinger and Fannemel sealed second and third place respectively in the tournament’s overall leaderboard with Stoch coming out as the clear winner with a total of 1108.8 points.
Freitag, who was Stoch’s main competitor in the first two legs, was absent from the final stage due to an injury he sustained after a bad landing in Innsbruck.
Stoch holds a 12-point lead in the World Cup standings followed by Freitag and Wellinger, with the latter 154 points adrift of the Pole.
(Reporting by Aditi Prakash in Bengaluru, editing by Ed Osmond)
