By Mitch Phillips
ZHANGJIAKOU, China (Reuters) – Norway’s Jarl Magnus Riiber, in action at the Winter Olympics for the first time after a two-week COVID-19 quarantine, produced a remarkable jump to seize the initiative in the Nordic combined large hill/10km event on Tuesday.
Riiber tested positive on arrival in Beijing and was released from isolation only on Monday, but he immediately delivered the best jump in Tuesday’s practice round and backed it up with a massive 142 metre leap for 139.8 points and a hefty 44-second lead in the competition round.
Japan’s Ryota Yamamoto, who had the longest jump in the normal hill competition but faded to 14th, and Kristjan Ilves of Estonia were next-best on 128.7 points.
Manuel Faisst justified his late call-up to the German team with a fourth-best 128 points, and Japan’s Akioto Watabe was fifth on 126.4.
Austria’s world champion Johannes Lamparter, the World Cup leader after a consistent run of first and second places, is one minute, 27 seconds off the lead in eighth place.
Vinzenz Geiger of Germany, who produced an amazing late bust to win the normal hill gold last week, looks out of the running for another title after finishing 14th, 2:15 behind.
Defending champion Johannes Rydzek of Germany, who seemed nailed on to win normal hill gold before hitting the wall and fading to fifth, will start 2:18 back.
Joergen Graabak of Norway, the 2014 champion who also found a late burst of energy to take an unlikely silver in the normal hill event, will start 2:07 behind, but the chasers’ chances of hunting down the leader will depend on how much fitness Riiber has lost through his illness and isolation.
The 24-year-old double normal hill world champion will lead the field out into the 10km cross country ski race at 18.30 local time (10.30 GMT), brought forward 30 minutes due to concerns about temperature, which dipped to -23 Celsius on Monday night and was at -19 by the end of the ski jump leg.
(Reporting by Mitch Phillips, editing by Ed Osmond)
