Japan's Ryoyu Kobayashi placed top with one event to go at the prestigious Four Hills Tournament in the men's ski jumping World Cup after securing his third straight runner-up finish Wednesday.
Kobayashi leaped for 128.5 and 132 meters with his two attempts in Innsbruck, Austria, to score 258.7 points, raising his tournament total to 857.6. Germany's Andreas Wellinger, fifth on this hill, is 4.8 points behind Kobayashi heading into the final leg later this week.
Austrian Jan Hoerl was Wednesday's winner with 267.5 points and sits third overall on 834.0.
"(The conditions) got rough as expected, but I was steady and put in good performances," said Kobayashi, who adapted himself to a windy large hill, where his second jump excited the crowd of some 21,000.
Kobayashi won all four events in the 2018-19 season for his maiden Four Hills overall championship. He fell just short of becoming the first jumper to sweep all four hills twice, missing the podium at the final event en route to his 2021-2022 championship.
The Beijing Olympics normal hill champion and large hill silver medalist is yet to win a World Cup event this season, and the 27-year-old has an ideal scenario in mind but is not getting ahead of himself.
"I want to win the event (and secure the Four Hills), as one would expect," Kobayashi said. "(But) I've been chasing from behind all the time this season, so I'll concentrate on my performance."
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