Four Hills Tournament 1975/76

24th Four Hills Tournament
winner
Tour winner	Jochen Danneberg
Oberstdorf	Toni Innauer
Garmisch-Partenkirchen	Toni Innauer
innsbruck	Jochen Danneberg
Bischofshofen	Toni Innauer
Attendees
Nations	15th
athlete	95
← 1974/75	1976/77 →

At the 24th Four Hills Tournament 1975/76 the jumping took place in Oberstdorf on December 30th, on January 1st the jumping in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and on January 4th the jumping in Innsbruck followed . The event in Bischofshofen took place on January 6th.

Attendees

In preparation for the Olympic Games , which took place in Innsbruck a few weeks later , all ski jumping nations except the Japanese and Italians came. Although only 15 teams registered, 95 jumpers took part, as some nations nominated more jumpers than usual; First of all the Swedes, who sent eight jumpers into the competition. In addition, the Austrian selection trainer Baldur Preiml enjoyed the privilege of being able to choose from a large group of good jumpers, so that he ultimately nominated 13 jumpers, but only eight of them completed all four jumping competitions. After the furious comeback in the previous year , in which the Austria Eagles celebrated a triple success in the overall standings, the Preiml protégés were inevitably the favorites and once again had two candidates for victory in Karl Schnabl and last year's winner Willi Pürstl . Edi Federer , who was second last year after all, fell through the sieve because of the quality of his team-mates and was only used as a forerunner, as was the talent Alois Lipburger . For the first time, the only 16-year-old Armin Kogler sniffed the touring air as a forerunner. The experts, on the other hand, had another Austrian on the bill in advance, who had not yet really come into play at the Four Hills Tournament. Debuting at the New Year's competition in 1974 at the age of 15, Toni Innauer had a serious fall in the previous year at the start in Oberstdorf. But a few weeks later he became Junior European Champion and shortly afterwards won the legendary jumping at Holmenkollen at the age of just 16. Since Innauer showed excellent form in the first training jumps in the Olympic season, he was one of the favorites. The biggest competitor of the Austrians was the team from the GDR around the double world champion and tour winner from 1974 , Hans-Georg Aschenbach , as well as the current runner- up world champion in ski flying , Rainer Schmidt . Coach Dieter Neuendorf's protégés had recovered from the shock of the previous season and had caught up with the Austrians, especially in the material sector. Instead of Eberhard Seifert and Heinz Wosipiwo , newcomer Martin Weber and returnees Bernd Eckstein had been nominated. However, one was not free from worry. Hans-Georg Aschenbach had to undergo knee surgery at the beginning of September 1975 and Danneberg, who was waiting for his breakthrough, barely escaped shoulder surgery and jumped with a bandage. From the other teams, at most individual athletes were included in the extended circle of favorites. Above all, the Swiss Walter Steiner was to be mentioned, tour second from 1974, who made his tour comeback after an injury-related absence the previous year. At the ski flying world championship in March 1975 on the Kulm, he had already proven with tenth place that he had not forgotten how to ski jumping. In addition, there was the current ski flying world champion Karel Kodejška as well as the long-running Rudolf Höhnl from Czechoslovakia, the strong Pole Stanisław Bobak and the Soviet jumpers around old master Gari Napalkow , from whose ranks new talents repeatedly advanced to the top of the world. With the Scandinavians, however, apart from the Norwegian Frithjof Prydz , fourth in the last ski flying world championship, there was no victory jumper in sight. The German DSV hoped for fresh impulses with the new national coach Wolfgang Happle .

nation	Athletes
BR Germany	Alfred Grosche , Sepp Schwinghammer , Rudi Tusch , Peter Leitner , Frank Rombach , Albert Wursthorn
GDR	Henry Glass , Rainer Schmidt , Hans-Georg Aschenbach , Dietrich Kampf , Jochen Danneberg , Dietmar Aschenbach , Bernd Eckstein , Martin Weber
Austria	Reinhold Bachler , Willi Pürstl , Hans Millonig , Karl Schnabl , Toni Innauer , Rudi Wanner , Walter Schwabl , Walter Habersatter jr. , Hans Wallner , Rupert Gürtler
Bulgaria	Ivan Jankov , Zdravko Zdravkov , Valentin Boschkow , Petar Dimitrov
Finland	Esko Rautionaho , Jouko Törmänen , Tapio Räisänen , Pekka Hyvärinen , Esa Mattila , Harri Blumén , Tauno Käyhkö
France	Gilbert Poirot , Philippe Jacoberger , Michel Roche , Jean-Claude Gaillard
Yugoslavia	Branko Dolhar , Bogdan Norčič , Janez Demsar , Janez Lostrek , Peter Štefančič , Marko Mlakar
Canada	Peter Wilson , Richard Grady , Richard Graves , Paul Martin , Kim Fripp , Donald Grady
Norway	Kai Solbustad , Johan Sætre , Finn Halvorsen , Per Bergerud , Odd Grette , Bjarne Naes , Frithjof Prydz
Poland	Aleksander Stołowski , Adam Krzysztofiak , Stanisław Bobak , Janusz Waluś , Tadeusz Pawlusiak
Sweden	Christer Karlsson , Odd Brandsegg , Thomas Lundgren , Håkon Lindbæck , Anders Lundqvist , Rolf Nordgren , Nils-Olov Westberg , Lennart Elimä
Switzerland	Hans Schmid , Ernst von Grünigen , Robert Mösching , Ernst Egloff , Walter Steiner , Josef Bonetti
Soviet Union	Juri Kalinin , Alexei Borowitin , Sergei Suslikow , Alexander Karapusow , Gari Napalkow , Yuri Ivanov , Sergei Saitschik
Czechoslovakia	Rudolf Höhnl , Karel Kodejška , Leoš Škoda , Jindřich Balcar , Ivo Felix , Jaroslav Balcar , Zdeněk Jánouch
United States	Greg Windsperger , Jerry Martin , Chris McNeill , Ron Steele

Rule changes

After the material battle of the previous year, in which the Austrians were enormously superior to the competition for a short time with new jump suits, new jump ski models and high boots and were able to celebrate a surprising triple success, the FIS had tried to create uniform conditions for all jumpers again by making changes to the regulations To set limits to experiments in the field of materials. Almost all of Baldur Preiml's material innovations were thus reversed and banned. The new rule 440 of the International Competition Rules of the FIS now forbade making changes and shapes to the equipment and devices used, which additionally favor the flight characteristics or involve increased dangers . In the following, a total of seven points specified what was allowed for jump suits. In addition, the rule has now been introduced that the three best jumpers of each jumping competition had to bring their jump suits for inspection after the award ceremony. Since, among other things, the sports management of the DSLV in cooperation with other national associations had pushed for the rule changes, the duel between Austria and GDR became even more fierce.

Oberstdorf

• Date: December 30, 1975
• Country: BR Germany 
• Hill: Schattenbergschanze
• Spectators: 20,000

The eagerly awaited duel between Austria and GDR kept what it promised and ended with Toni Innauer's first individual victory on the tour. Even after training, the 17-year-old was expected by the experts with the front. From the GDR selection, however, Jochen Danneberg in particular made life difficult for him, who was still leading after the first round. The competition was especially exciting because after a good jump by a GDR athlete, the next Austrian could still top it off. Only last year's winner Pürstl had to bury his hopes for a good placement after a fall after the first round. In the second round, Danneberg threw the gauntlet with 109 m, which was the best distance of the day up until then. But Innauer was able to respond by setting the hill record of 110 m and ultimately the first jump deserves to be won, as various coaches have unanimously stated. Former master Reinhold Bachler took an excellent third place ahead of Hans-Georg Aschenbach. With the Pole Bobak (6th), the Swiss Steiner (9th) and somewhat surprisingly the West German Sepp Schwinghammer (10th) only three jumpers from other nations were able to intervene in the big duel. The high level of jumping, which ran flawlessly with the same materials, was unanimously praised. The heated material discussions in the run-up seemed to have already been forgotten.

Item	Jumper	country	Points
01	Toni Innauer	Austria	252.2
02	Jochen Danneberg	GDR	249.8
03	Reinhold Bachler	Austria	247.1
04th	Hans-Georg Aschenbach	GDR	242.8
05	Stanislaw Bobak	Poland	239.2
06th	Rudolf Wanner	Austria	239.0
07th	Karl Schnabl	Austria	238.2
08th	Bernd Eckstein	GDR	237.0
09	Walter Steiner	Switzerland	236.1
10	Sepp Schwinghammer	BR Germany	229.8

Garmisch-Partenkirchen

• Date: January 1, 1976
• Country: BR Germany 
• Hill: Large Olympic hill

The GDR-Austria duel continued at the New Year's event and Toni Innauer was able to prevail again. However, the competition was less dramatic than the opening jump, which was mainly due to a blow-dryer. This was shown, among other things, in the fact that in the second run four fifths of the jumpers could no longer exceed the distances from the first run. This also included Innauer, who ultimately only won the first round thanks to his best distance of 95 m in the first round, just ahead of compatriot Karl Schnabl, who was one of the few who was able to improve a little in the second round. In third place came Jochen Danneberg, who with the two Austrians had already separated from the rest of the field after the first round with widths of more than 90 m. The dominance of the Austrians was no longer so pronounced in Garmisch, last year's winner Pürstl finally had to bury all top ten ambitions with 44th place. With places five and ten, the Soviet jumpers showed their skills for the first time, the sixth place of the Swiss from Grünigen came as a surprise. In the overall standings Innauer was ahead of Danneberg, but with a difference of six points there was no world between the two top jumpers. The Austrian dominance was shown in such a way that four of Preiml's protégés were placed among the six best jumpers. Besides Danneberg, only Hans-Georg Aschenbach was able to stand up to the Austrians.

Intermediate result after 2 jumps
Item	Jumper	Points
01.	Innauer	483.5
02.	Danneberg	477.3
03.	Schnabl	467.8
04th	Bachler	461.8
05.	Aschenbach	455.0
06th	Wanner	445.5

Item	Jumper	country	Points
01	Toni Innauer	Austria	231.3
02	Karl Schnabl	Austria	229.5
03	Jochen Danneberg	GDR	227.5
04th	Reinhold Bachler	Austria	214.7
05	Alexei Borowitin	Soviet Union	213.0
06th	Ernst von Grünigen	Switzerland	212.9
07th	Stanislaw Pawlusiak	Poland	212.5
08th	Hans-Georg Aschenbach	GDR	212.2
09	Dietmar Aschenbach	GDR	208.6
10	Alexander Karapusov	Soviet Union	207.7

innsbruck

• Date: January 4, 1976
• Country: Austria 
• Ski jump: Bergisel ski jump
• 30,000 spectators

The spectators excitedly looked forward to Toni Innauer's third victory, because anything but a victory for the Austrian was hardly an issue. But the day of the jump ended with a huge disappointment, which was mainly due to the bad weather. The day before, the training had been stopped at the end, because the foothills of the so-called Capella hurricane were up to mischief in Austria and influenced the jumping operation with high wind speeds. For this reason, only one trial run was scheduled on the day of the jump so that the competition could begin immediately. However, when 18-year-old Peter Leitner , carried by a gust of wind, improved the hill record by 3 m to 103 m, the jury decided to repeat the first round after 20 jumpers with a shortened run-up. Nevertheless, wind peaks of up to 10 m / s still prevailed, which also became the undoing of the top favorite Innauer. Having gotten off the table too early, he had to break off the jump to avoid falling. At 73 m, he ended up over 20 m shorter than the best jumpers in the first round. After this, with Bachler, Schnabl and Wanner, three Austrians led the ranking before Danneberg. In the second run, however, the Thuringian was able to improve the most and jumped with 99.5 m daily best and 10.5 m further than in the first run. In the end, this was enough for the day's victory with just 1.4 points ahead of Karl Schnabl, who had also improved in the second round. Reinhold Bachler took third place again. Walter Steiner came back with fourth place, making up a few places in the overall standings. This now led Danneberg, because Innauer lost over 40 points to Danneberg due to his failed first jump and a 24th place in the daily standings and even slipped from the podium to fourth in the overall standings. With ten points behind, Karl Schnabl was now Danneberg's worst opponent. With 34th place in the daily standings, Hans-Georg Aschenbach had said goodbye to the fight for a podium place in the overall standings.

Intermediate result after 3 jumps
Item	Jumper	Points
01.	Danneberg	698.2
02.	Schnabl	687.4
03.	Bachler	679.5
04th	Innauer	665.0
05.	Wanner	650.9
06th	Steiner	640.2

Item	Jumper	country	Points
01	Jochen Danneberg	GDR	220.9
02	Karl Schnabl	Austria	219.5
03	Reinhold Bachler	Austria	217.7
04th	Walter Steiner	Switzerland	208.3
05	Rudi Wanner	Austria	205.4
06th	Rudolf Höhnl	Czechoslovakia	203.0
07th	Hans Wallner	Austria	198.1
08th	Johan Sætre	Norway	196.5
08th	Walter Schwabl	Austria	196.5
10	Sepp Schwinghammer	BR Germany	195.7
...
24	Toni Innauer	Austria	181.5

Bischofshofen

• Date: January 6, 1976
• Country: Austria 
• Hill: Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze

In pouring rain Toni Innauer wanted to wipe out the saddle from Innsbruck, and he succeeded impressively. However, after the first round it didn't look like it at all: For the first time, jumpers from teams other than the GDR and Austria set the tone. Having already jumped into the top ten in Innsbruck, the Norwegian Johan Sætre led the ranking after a 100 m jump. The strong Bobak from Poland followed in front of Jochen Danneberg and Toni Innauer. Karl Schnabl, Danneberg's worst competitor in the overall standings, was 4.3 points behind the overall leader in the daily standings. In the second round, Innauer in particular rose brilliantly, who improved the hill record by 2 m with 108 m. This meant the third win of the day for the Austrian ahead of Bobak and Sætre. Karl Schnabl improved to fourth place with 104 m and thus placed himself ahead of Danneberg, but the two athletes were only separated by 1.5 points in the narrow outcome of the competition. Reinhold Bachler crowned his best touring season with an excellent fifth place.

Item	Jumper	country	Points
01	Toni Innauer	Austria	236.2
02	Stanislaw Bobak	Poland	225.5
03	Johan Sætre	Norway	225.0
04th	Karl Schnabl	Austria	223.5
05	Reinhold Bachler	Austria	222.4
06th	Jochen Danneberg	GDR	222.0
07th	Rudolf Wanner	Austria	218.0
08th	Bernd Eckstein	GDR	216.9
09	Rudolf Höhnl	Czechoslovakia	212.2
10	Alexei Borowitin	Soviet Union	211.2

Total status

The eagerly awaited GDR-Austria duel was clearly won by the Alpen-Adler, with four jumpers among the top five they were by far the best team. However, Jochen Danneberg from the GDR snatched the tour victory, which resulted in an enormously heated atmosphere in the run-up to the Olympic Games in Austria. The tragic hero was undoubtedly Toni Innauer, who despite three daily victories could not win the tour, ultimately even missed a podium place by the tiny 0.7 points. Since then, the Austrian is the last jumper who suffered this mishap. Innauer no longer made his peace with the tour as an athlete, and in the following year he only finished fourth. Nevertheless, in addition to Innauer with Schnabl, the regurgitated veteran Bachler and Rudi Wanner, selection coach Baldur Preiml had a whole range of medal candidates for the Olympic Games in his team. With the GDR selection, however, the mood was mixed. The joy about the fifth tour winner and the overall seventh overall victory for the GDR was great, but behind Danneberg there was already a considerable gap in the GDR selection. If returnees Bernd Eckstein could still convince with ninth place, the remaining GDR jumpers were below their possibilities. Three weeks before the Olympics, Bobak from Poland, Steiner from Switzerland and Saetre from Norway had also shown themselves to be other favorites.

rank	Surname	nation	Overall rating	Colonel village	Garmisch- Partenk.	Inns- Bruckhaus	Episcopate hofen
01	Jochen Danneberg	GDR	920.0	249.8 / 02.	227.5 / 03.	220.9 / 01.	222.0 / 06.
02	Karl Schnabl	Austria	910.9	238.2 / 07.	229.6 / 02.	219.6 / 02.	223.5 / 04.
03	Reinhold Bachler	Austria	901.9	247.1 / 03.	214.7 / 04.	217.7 / 03.	222.4 / 05.
04th	Toni Innauer	Austria	901.2	252.2 / 01.	231.3 / 01.	181.5 / 24.	236.2 / 01.
05	Rudi Wanner	Austria	868.9	239.0 / 06.	206.5 / 13.	205.4 / 05.	218.0 / 07.
06th	Stanislaw Bobak	Poland	851.4	239.2 / 05.	196.7 / 22.	190.0 / 15.	225.5 / 02.
07th	Walter Steiner	Switzerland	848.6	236.1 / 09.	195.8 / 24.	208.3 / 04.	208.4 / 14.
08th	Rudolf Höhnl	Czechoslovakia	847.8	227.8 / 11.	204.8 / 15.	203.0 / 06.	212.2 / 09.
09	Bernd Eckstein	GDR	837.8	237.0 / 08.	194.1 / 27.	189.8 / 16.	216.9 / 08.
10	Sepp Schwinghammer	BR Germany	831.6	229.8 / 07.	195.0 / 26.	195.7 / 10.	211.1 / 11.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Preiml: Cautious Optimist . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna December 28, 1975, p. 19 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
2. ↑ Neues Deutschland, September 5, 1975, p. 5
3. ↑ The wind angered Toni . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna January 6, 1976, p. 12 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
4. ↑ Berliner Zeitung of October 18, p. 4
5. ^ New Germany of December 30, 1975 p. 5
6. ↑ Den Toni hypnotized to victory . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna December 31, 1975, p. 15 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
7. ↑ Neues Deutschland from December 1975 p. 5
8. ↑ Innauer is aiming for fourfold victory . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna January 3, 1976, p. 16 ( Arbeiter-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
9. ↑ Neues Deutschland from January 2, 1976 p. 5
10. ↑ The wind angered Toni . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna January 6, 1976, p. 12 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
11. ↑ Berliner Zeitung of January 5, 1976 p. 5
12. ↑ ^{a b} Springer reserves exhausted . In: Arbeiter-Zeitung . Vienna January 8, 1976, p. 7 ( berufer-zeitung.at - the open online archive - digitized).
13. ↑ Berliner Zeitung of January 7, 1976 p. 7