After the team event had to be cancelled due to strong winds in the morning, the provisional competition round (PCR) was used and the competition format changed to an Individual Gundersen, a method developed by Norway's World Championships medallist Gunder Gundersen.

Starting with ski jumping on the normal hill, each contestant makes two jumps which are scored on distance and style.

The winner of the ski jump competition starts first in the 15 kilometres race, followed by the descending order of ski jump finishers.

Final jumping scores are computed into time differential for starting after the first skier has left.

The first skier to cross the finish line is the winner of the event.

Riessle ultimately crossed in 25 min 22.4sec, 12.5 seconds ahead of Japan’s Akito Watabe and 15.2 seconds faster than third-placed Finn Ilkka Herola.

"It finally worked with my first World Cup victory," said Riessle.

"It’s even better that it worked out at the very first World Cup event in 2015-16.

"Now I’m in yellow in Lillehammer again.

"It's absolutely amazing and I’ll be very happy if it continues like this in the next events."

With Poland’s Szczepan Kupczak in the lead after the PCR, a newcomer started first on the 10 kilometre track at the Birkebeineren Ski Stadium.

After his 133.5 metre jump yesterday, Kupczak had a lead of nine seconds on runner-up Fabian Steindl of Austria and 10 seconds on Falun silver-medallist Francois Braud of France.

In the race, Riessle  showed his ambition to go for his first individual victory from the outset.

He quickly overtook slower skiers Kupczak and Steindl after forming a leading group with Braud, Watabe, Herola, Austria’s Bernhard Gruber and Germany’s Manuel Faisst, and then broke away on the second lap. 

In an amazing show of strength, Riessle skied towards victory alone having previously held leads of up to 30 seconds.  

While the German was able to enjoy his success on the last lap, the fight for the podium behind him was still on.

The immediate followers had narrowed down to Watabe, Herola and Gruber and it was the Austrian world champion who missed out on the podium.

Watabe came second to add to his already vast collection of silver medals, while Herola, usually known as a strong ski jumper, had a superb race to cruise towards the first podium of his career.


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