Friday night the World Cup Panel decided to postpone the jump preliminaries based on a somewhat improved forcast of less wind but some rain instead of the heavy gusting and whitecaps. As it turned out, the improved forcast was wrong as well. Instead of moderate winds and showers, Saturday arrived with dead calm and sunny skies. Although a little breeze picked up during the day, it was a jump friendly slight headwind well received by all.
At 8:30 am the women’s jump preliminaries started. The excellent conditions saw equally good skiing. The women had a hard fight and newcomer Nancy Chardin FRA excelled with a 2nd in the prelims behind World Champion Angeliki Andrioupoulou GRE who jumped 51.8m. following Nancy were June Fladborg DEN and Marie Vympranietsova GRE to fill in the four skiers in the finals.
The men’s preliminary provided drama and records almost as if it were a finals. Wild Card invited skier Igor Morozov RUS set a new Russian record of 62.0 m to the delight of the large Dubna crowd. Jaret Llewellyn CAN was the next to last skier out and set a new course record of 67.3m. Freddy Krueger USA was challeneged by this but up to the task and jumped 68.0m to set yet another Volga River course record. The other finals positions were set by a razor thin margin with Jason Seels GBR jumping 65.6, Ryan Dodd CAN at 65.5 and finally Mark Lane USA and Scot Ellis USA tieing at 65.4.