Kobayashi and Kramer claim top prize at Olympic prelude in Willingen

Ryoyu Kobayashi underlined his status as front-runner for the Olympic large hill title with gold in the final competition before Beijing 2022 in Willingen. The Four Hills champion has recaptured the top form he showed in 2019 in perfect time for his second Olympics and was a convincing winner in Germany.The Japanese leapt 145m and top stylistic points saw him claim victory with a total of 115.6 points, well clear of closest challenger Halvor Egner Granerud.

Kobayashi finished sixth in the large hill and seventh in the normal hill on Olympic debut in PyeongChang and is poised to vastly improve on that return in China. On the women's side, Austria's Marita Kramer stole a march on her rivals with a 13th World Cup victory.Germany's Katharina Althaus and Slovenia's Ema Klinec both jumped further but a high style mark saw Kramer over the line with a score of 80.2.Sportsbeat 2022 Ad/> Ski JumpingGeiger leads the way as Germany take two podium spots at Ski Jumping World Cup23/01/2022 AT 19:10 Ski JumpingGeiger reclaims Ski Jumping World Cup lead as German squad look to dominate in Beijing22/01/2022 AT 18:30 /> Zakopane'He is there!' — Lindvik dominates ski jump in Zakopane16/01/2022 AT 22:59