Where is the tour for women?

Austria's ski president Roswitha Stadlober said this at a press event about the so-called New Year's Eve tournament in Villach and Ljubno. What initially sounded like a side note caused anger and irritation among the athletes. The thin explanation that there are “many factors that still need to be taken into account that do not make an earlier introduction possible” was hardly reassuring.

The introduction of the new New Year's Eve tournament around the turn of the year was a further step. But it's not the tour they've been aiming for for years, where the men are getting huge attention this winter for the 71st time. And jumping on normal hills in Villach and Ljubno, Slovenia, instead of in the large arenas in Oberstdorf, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Innsbruck and Bischofshofen also feels more like an extra program than real integration.

Female athletes are fed up The jumpers, whose fight for “equality on the hill” during the tour are particularly interested every year, are accordingly served. The German jumper Luisa Görlich openly expressed her displeasure. “The competitions in Titisee and Lillehammer showed on site and on TV screens that the time is ripe for a women’s Four Hills Tournament. Against this background, it is an outrage to have postponed the decision to go on our own tour in the age of gender equality!” wrote Görlich in her column sport.de .

Lara Malsiner & Co. want a tour. © Skijumpingpl

Olympic champion Maren Lundby applauded on social media and “totally” agreed with the clear words: “It’s time to bring the women to the Four Hills Tournament.” This has actually been the consensus in the ski jumping cosmos for years. Even before the corona pandemic, the presidents of the ski clubs met with the national ski associations and the rights holders to work on solutions. Then came two winters without spectators and the project took a back seat.

Now this week 25 fans and with them normality are returning to Oberstdorf, where the tour traditionally begins. Only women will not be jumping in the Allgäu on Wednesday and Thursday (000 p.m.) - and that will most likely be the case at least next winter, if the words of ÖSV President Stadlober are to be believed. How can it be that a project that is actually wanted by all sides has been stalled for years?

Process is slow Everything was actually clear in April. The associations announced: The women's tour is coming, the premiere is scheduled for 2023/24. In Germany, the Oberstdorf and Garmisch stations were to be reversed; in Austria, they wanted to use the year and a half “to clarify all open questions and the respective framework conditions together with all stakeholders”. That has now been shattered.

At other points in the calendar, the involvement of women works better. Before the start of the season, Fis race director Sandro Pertile reported on mats in Wisla how the world association had managed to let Poland organize women's World Cup jumping for the first time. “Our agreement with the Poles was: You save the money for energy, but you invest the money in the women. “That’s a great solution,” said Pertile Heilbronner voice. Such a solution does not yet appear to be in sight for a ski jumping tour.

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Where is the tour for women?

The ski jumping premiere, which was widely announced for next winter, was almost casually canceled. A Four Hills Tournament for women? Something like this shouldn't happen until the 2024/25 season at the earliest.

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