Four Hills Tournament 1966/67

15. Four Hills Tournament
winner
Tour winner	Bjørn Wirkola
Oberstdorf	Dieter Neuendorf
Garmisch-Partenkirchen	Bjørn Wirkola
innsbruck	Bjørn Wirkola
Bischofshofen	Bjørn Wirkola
Attendees
Nations	16 ( AUT , CAN , FIN , FRA , FRG , GDR , ITA , JPN , NOR , POL , SUI , SWE , TCH , URS , USA , YUG ,)
athlete	76
← 1965/66	1967/68 →

At the 15th Four Hills Tournament 1966/67 the jumping took place in Oberstdorf on December 30th, on January 1st the jumping in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and on January 6th the jumping in Innsbruck followed . The event in Bischofshofen took place on January 8th. Overall winner was the Norwegian Bjørn Wirkola, ahead of the Austrian Sepp Lichtenegger and Dieter Neuendorf from the GDR.

Nominee athletes

With Kankkonen, Neuendorf and Wirkola, the three defining protagonists of the last tour were at the start again, with Wirkola as a two-time world champion from Holmenkollen ascribed a certain favorite role. With the newcomer Franz Keller, the West German team had the current German champion at the start, from whom they expected a lot. Sepp Bradl, coach of the Austrians, also expected his team to have a successful tour after years of dry spell.

nation	Athletes
BR Germany	Wolfgang Happle , Henrik Ohlmeyer , Heini Ihle , Franz Keller , Günther Göllner , Alfred Winkler , Oswald Schinze , Karl-Heinz Munk
GDR	Dieter Neuendorf , Veit Kühr , Manfred Queck , Peter Lesser , Wolfgang Stöhr , Heinz Schmidt
Austria	Max Golser , Sepp Lichtenegger , Willy Schuster , Baldur Preiml , Reinhold Bachler , Albert Heim , Walter Schwabl , Erich Schwabl , Fritz Gamweger , Willi Egger , Heinz Themesl , Janko Zwitter , Franz Kuchlbacher
Finland	Veikko Kankkonen , Niilo Halonen , Heikki Väisänen , Olli Korhonen , Erkki Pukka , Paavo Maunu
France	Alain Macle , Gilbert Poirot , Jean-Marie Poirot , James Yerrly
Japan	Takashi Fujisawa , Yoshihiko Itō , Kimio Saitō
Yugoslavia	Ludvik Zajc , Marjan Pečar , Peter Eržen , Stanko Smolej
Italy	Giacomo Aimoni , Mario Cecon , Ezio Damolin
Canada	Ulf Kvendbo , Pat Morris , Slawomir Kardas
Norway	Björn Wirkola , Ronald Jensen , Christoffer Selbekk
Poland	Józef Przybyła , Piotr Wala , Ryszard Witke , Józef Kocyan
Sweden	Mats Östman , Tord Karlsson , Tommy Karlsson
Switzerland	Hans Schmid , Sepp Zehnder , Max Walter , Richard Pfiffner
Soviet Union	Koba Zakadze , Mikhail Veretennikow , Valeri Jemeljanow , Pyotr Kovalenko
Czechoslovakia	Jiří Raška , Rudolf Höhnl , Zbyněk Hubač , František Rydval , Dalibor Motejlek , Ladislav Divila
United States	Jay Martin , Adrian Watt , Dave Lundmark

Oberstdorf

• Date: December 30, 1966
• Country: BR Germany 
• Hill: Schattenbergschanze
• Spectators: 5,000

In adverse weather conditions, where snow, sunshine and rain constantly alternated, the GDR jumpers ensured a not necessarily expected double success by Dieter Neuendorf and Peter Lesser. While Valery Jemeljanow was still in the lead after the first round, Neuendorf was able to push himself to the top with the daily best distance of 73.5 meters. Overall, the competition remained exciting until the end and even the ninth placed athlete was not even ten points behind the winner of the day. Sepp Lichtenegger, who finished fifth, made sure that the Austrians were satisfied. Due to the close result of the competition, in which the co-favorites Wirkola and Kankkonen even shared third place, Neuendorf could not break away in terms of the overall ranking.

Item	Jumper	country	Points
1.	Dieter Neuendorf	GDR	202.2
2.	Peter Lesser	GDR	201.5
3.	Veikko Kankkonen	Finland	200.6
	Bjørn Wirkola	Norway	200.6
5.	Sepp Lichtenegger	Austria	198.9
6th	Józef Przybyła	Poland	198.3
7th	Valery Emelyanov	Soviet Union	194.5
	Mikhail Veretennikov	Soviet Union	194.5
9.	Wolfgang Stöhr	GDR	192.6
10.	Zbyněk Hubač	Czechoslovakia	190.3

Garmisch-Partenkirchen

• Date: January 1, 1967
• Country: BR Germany 
• Hill: Large Olympic hill

In constant rain, Bjørn Wirkola was the measure of all things thanks to his posture notes, but also set a scent mark in the first run with the daily best of 91.5. Since the track became even softer in the second round, no one was able to outstrip the Norwegian. However, with a jump of 89.5 meters, the Austrian Reinhold Bachler was able to take a surprisingly second 0.4 points ahead of the Finn Kankkonen. Dieter Neuendorf came in 8.5 points behind Wirkola in fourth place and thus lost the overall lead. Nevertheless, the deficit before the jumping in Innsbruck was by no means impossible to catch up.

Intermediate result after 2 jumps
Item	Jumper	Points
01.	Wirkola	429.6
02.	Kankkonen	423.0
03.	Neuendorf	422.7

Item	Jumper	country	Points
1.	Bjørn Wirkola	Norway	229.0
2.	Reinhold Bachler	Austria	222.8
3.	Veikko Kankkonen	Finland	222.4
4th	Dieter Neuendorf	GDR	220.5
5.	Manfred Queck	GDR	215.8
6th	Valery Emelyanov	Soviet Union	214.1
7th	Peter Lesser	GDR	213.0
8th.	Ronald Jensen	Norway	209.4
9.	Jiří Raška	Czechoslovakia	208.8
10.	Max Golser	Austria	208.4

innsbruck

• Date: January 6, 1967
• Country: Austria 
• Ski jump: Bergisel ski jump
• Spectators: 10,000

The jumping in Innsbruck should be a preliminary decision in the fight for the overall victory. At first, the front runner Wirkola even got whistles after the first round, as his 90-meter jump was rated so well that even starters jumping further had to line up behind him. Somewhat surprisingly, after the first round, Franz Keller was in second place and the hitherto unknown American jumper Jay Martin in third place. Co-favorite Dieter Neuendorf jumped the greatest distance in the first round with 92 meters, but due to his bad landing he got high point deductions in the stance. Veikko Kankkonen, another competitor Wirkolas could in principle bury his hopes for the overall victory after his 81 meters in the first round. Sepp Lichtenegger, who was initially in fifth place, created enthusiasm among the audience. In the second round, however, Wirkola showed his clear title ambitions with the best distance of the day of 93.5 meters and ultimately won the competition ahead of the surprise runner-up Franz Keller and the Austrian Sepp Lichtenegger, who was acclaimed by the audience. Dieter Neuendorf initially got away from the take-off table well, but later got out of the aviation industry and had difficulty making the jump at 87 meters. With a deficit of over 20 points, he came in seventh place. After three competitions, Wirkola was 30 points ahead of Neuendorf, who still held a very good second place in the overall ranking. Thanks to his consistency and also benefiting from Kankkonen's 27th place, Neuendorf's team-mate Peter Lesser moved up to third place in the overall ranking.

Intermediate result after 3 jumps
Item	Jumper	Points
01.	Wirkola	667.3
02.	Neuendorf	637.1
03.	Lesser	629.7

Item	Jumper	country	Points
1.	Bjørn Wirkola	Norway	237.0
2.	Franz Keller	BR Germany	228.3
3.	Sepp Lichtenegger	Austria	223.2
4th	Christoffer Selbekk	Norway	222.0
5.	Jiří Raška	Czechoslovakia	215.9
6th	Peter Lesser	GDR	215.2
7th	Dieter Neuendorf	GDR	214.4
8th.	Jay Martin	United States	214.0
9.	Peter Eržen	Yugoslavia	213.7
10.	Jozef Kocyan	Poland	213.2

Bischofshofen

• Date: January 8, 1967
• Country: Austria 
• Hill: Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze

The jumping in Bischofshofen was more of a show for Wirkola, who clearly dominated the competition with jumps of 102 and 104 meters. Only Jiří Raška was able to keep up with the Norwegian with jumps of 100 and 101.5 meters. According to the press, Dieter Neuendorf, who did not jump with the last vigor, only made jumps of 95.5 and 96 meters, which in the end brought him into place. Sepp Lichtenegger again took a not exactly expected and much acclaimed third place and was able to gain valuable points in the overall standings on the jumpers placed in front of him up to then. Peter Lesser, who had been third up to that point, had to pay tribute to an injury he had suffered in training, but held himself up to 14th place.

Item	Jumper	country	Points
1.	Bjørn Wirkola	Norway	242.7
2.	Jiří Raška	Czechoslovakia	233.4
3.	Sepp Lichtenegger	Austria	219.4
4th	Ronald Jensen	Norway	219.1
5.	Veikko Kankkonen	Finland	214.8
6th	Dieter Neuendorf	GDR	209.4
	Zbyněk Hubač	Czechoslovakia	209.4
8th.	Franz Keller	BR Germany	208.9
9.	Adrian Watt	United States	206.8
10.	Manfred Queck	GDR	205.3

Total status

The Norwegian Bjørn Wirkola made his mark on the 15th Four Hills Tournament and won three of four competitions. Despite a rather surprising double victory of the GDR jumpers in the opening competition in Oberstdorf, Wirkola was able to steadily expand its lead over the competition in the following three competitions and in the end celebrate his first tour victory with a lead of over 60 points. The decisive factor was the jumping in Innsbruck, where Wirkola took over 20 points from his closest rival Dieter Neuendorf and co-favorite Veikko Kankkonen even had to bury hopes of a podium place in the overall standings with 27th place. With two third places in the last two competitions, the Austrian Sepp Lichtenegger was able to take second place in the overall standings in front of his home crowd, although he only caught up with Dieter Neuendorf in the last competition and relegated to third place with just under 1.1 points .

rank	Surname	nation	Overall rating	Colonel village	Garmisch- Partenk.	Inns- Bruckhaus	Episcopate hofen
01	Bjørn Wirkola	Norway	910.0	200.6 / 03.	229.0 / 01.	237.0 / 01.	242.7 / 01.
02	Sepp Lichtenegger	Austria	847.6	198.9 / 05.	206.1 / 16.	223.2 / 03.	219.4 / 03.
03	Dieter Neuendorf	GDR	846.5	202.2 / 01.	220.5 / 04.	214.4 / 07.	209.4 / 06.
04th	Veikko Kankkonen	Finland	834.8	200.6 / 03.	222.4 / 03.	197.0 / 27.	214.8 / 05.
05	Peter Lesser	GDR	833.0	201.5 / 02.	213.0 / 07.	215.2 / 06.	203.3 / 14.
06th	Franz Keller	BR Germany	820.8	180.2 / 23.	203.4 / 21.	228.3 / 02.	208.9 / 08.
07th	Jiří Raška	Czechoslovakia	820.1	162.0 / 42.	208.8 / 09.	215.9 / 05.	233.4 / 02.
08th	Zbyněk Hubač	Czechoslovakia	812.6	190.3 / 10.	206.6 / 15.	206.3 / 16.	209.4 / 06.
09	Józef Przybyła	Poland	811.9	198.3 / 06.	202.0 / 22.	207.0 / 15.	206.6 / 12.
10	Mikhail Veretennikov	Soviet Union	810.2	194.5 / 07.	207.9 / 12.	205.0 / 18.	202.8 / 15.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ A class jumper at the age of 17 . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna December 28, 1966, p. 12 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
2. ^ FIS-Ski - results Oberstdorf
3. ↑ Neues Deutschland from December 31, 1966 p. 6
4. ^ FIS-Ski - results Garmisch-Partenkirchen
5. ↑ Neues Deutschland from January 2, 1967 p. 4
6. ↑ FIS Ski Results Innsbruck
7. ↑ Neues Deutschland from January 7, 1967 p. 8
8. ↑ FIS ski results in Bischofshofen
9. ↑ Neues Deutschland from January 9, 1967 p. 4
10. ↑ FIS.Ski - Cup evaluation
11. ↑ FIS results list
12. ↑ FIS results list
13. ↑ FIS results list
14. ↑ FIS results list