Stoch’s last great goal. Perhaps more important than the Games. He already has an advantage

After the individual Olympic competition on the large hill, Kamil Stoch left the hill with. He said that he could not accept the lost fight for the podium and the fact that he did not use it to win another Olympic medal. In Beijing, however, Stoch went down in the history of the Olympic Games, because no other jumper was in the top six for six Olympic competitions in a row at three consecutive Games. And he did just that – from 2014 he was successively: 1st, 1st, 4th, 1st, 6th, 4.

The form of the best Polish jumper at this point in the season may not allow for winning, but Stoch himself is very close to his best disposition. And this is important because the season is not over at all. In fact, it can be said that for Stoch it is just beginning.

Kamil Stoch has one last great goal. Perhaps more important than the Olympics

The Games were not the last championship event this season. At the beginning of March we will have the flying world championships in Vikersund. And for Stoch, it may be an event even more important than the Olympics.

He has three Olympic gold medals, while at the World Championships in flying on the highest step of the podium he never stood. Yes, he won medals on them – he has individual silver and two bronze team discs. But only the longed-for gold would make Stoch the second player in history to win the Ski Jumping Grand Slam. He would have won the World Cup, the World Championship, the Olympic Games, the 4-Hills-Tournament and the ski flying world championship. He has only done it so far, Stoch is close to matching the Finnish legend.

Not only that – if he would add a small Crystal Ball to the world championship for flights, then no one could compare with the Pole. And these flights will not be missing in the coming weeks, because the last two weekends of the season are the flights in Oberstdorf and Planica that count for this classification.

A year ago we saw how important it is to him

We know Stoch and we know that in the interviews he will not put pressure on himself for the gold of the World Ski Championships, but it will definitely be his huge goal for this season. We don’t have to look far anyway. It is enough to go back to the 2019/2020 season, which was interrupted by the pandemic. It was about to end the flying championship in Planica and you could see how Stoch was getting ready for this event. He knew perfectly well that this was the last missing scalp in his rich career.

He grew up with each subsequent competition from mid-February. He won the half-interrupted tournament and was simply the best. It became clear that he would be the prime candidate for gold. Unfortunately for him, the competitions were moved to December. And although Stoch usually prepares the best form for January, February and March, it was then that he wanted to be ready in mid-December. But it was not possible to win. Stoch was devastated by his jumps and felt that a gigantic opportunity had passed his nose. It turned out that his form broke out two weeks later, and the Pole won the third 4-Hills-Tournament in his career.

Kamil Stoch may have an advantage over his rivals. Now the January break will come out

Now it seems that Stoch may have a small advantage over his rivals here in the second phase of the season. We have been emphasizing for years that a Pole is the oldest top jumper and sometimes he may lack strength. But it is worth noting that Stoch has by far the least jump this season in years. He paused in the most loaded contests in January due to a weaker form and then an injury. He came to the Games much more refreshed than others.

And this break for Stoch may pay off at the end of the season, when others will have the whole season behind them. In history, it also happened that some well-jumping athletes lost their form after the Olympics or were not as brilliant as before. The opening credits can be saturated with medals at the Olympics, and Stoch still has the most important goal ahead of him. He is insatiable and hellishly ambitious.

– Everything that happened in the last few or even several weeks influenced me and shaped me as a human being. I did my best to prepare myself as best as possible. Here too, although I did not avoid mistakes. There were competitions where I would win when I made mistakes like in China. It was impossible to do here, the level turned out to be too high. Although … I was fourth with a very late second jump, and not so long ago, after good jumps in my opinion, I didn’t enter the second round. Looking at it this way, it’s fine. I know I am in good shape and equipment now. I have to keep doing my job – said Stoch in an interview with Przegląd Sportowy.

Stoch will not let go of the end of the season and it seems that this may be his moment. The staff has finally refined the equipment issues, physical condition and technique also seem to be at the right level. So what the end of the season will look like will be mainly determined by mental preparation and proper prioritization.

The best information for fans and Stoch himself may be that at the Olympics, the Pole showed his best jumps not in training, but in the first competition series. That is, in the moments when he had to mobilize himself the most. Of course, the second attempts were late and resulted in the lack of a medal, but history has always shown that Stoch’s ideal form was always preceded by competitions in which he made one great jump and the other slightly worse. And in each of the last five seasons, the Pole had a moment when he jumped by far the best in the world and was unstoppable. It is possible that in the 2021/22 season, this moment is still ahead of him.

Kamil Stoch’s podiums by months (WC, WC, WCWL, IO):

November – 4
December – 18
January – 29
February – 16
March 18