Ski Jumping, History of Origins

In the 19th century, the first people to take an interest in skiing as a sport were the Norwegians. Modern ski jumping owes its origin largely to a folk custom of the Norwegians to compete in the art of skiing from the mountains (slalom). The native land of ski jumping is the mountainous Norwegian province of Telemark. As early as 1840 there were the first slalom competitions. Initially, jumping was part of the slalom. Norwegians jumped from relatively high, natural ledges located on the slopes, later began to be used specially constructed elevations or springboards. For a long time jumpers landed on level ground, and only later hill landing ski jumps were made sloping. The length of the flight was not measured – the important thing was to fly as high as possible. Official registration of the distance of jumps began in 1868, the first recorded result – 19 meters.

Beginning in 1906, skiers began holding their own “skiing” competitions, which consisted of races downhill and cross-country skiing. These competitions later included twists and jumps off small jumps. Gradually, more and more narrow specialization resulted in a number of independent sports – racing, slalom, and ski jumping. Ski jumping began to develop as an independent sport of skiing.

The Winter Olympics and World Ski Championships were preceded (since 1901) by an international competition – the Nordic Games. Since the 1920s, the International Ski Federation (FIS) has held worldwide competitions in all kinds of ski sports, including ski jumping competitions.

In the program of the first Winter Olympics in 1924 in Chamonix were included 70-meter ski jumping, since 1964 – from 70- and 90-meter ski jumps.

In 1925, Czechoslovakia hosted the first World Ski Championships. In 1929, the FIS decided that the gap of 4 years between the next Olympic Games was too long and decided to hold annual world championships for all sports in skiing. From 1950 racing, biathlon and jumping championships were held once every 4 years between the Olympic Games and once every two years after 1982.

The history of ski jumping is the story of a constant search for the most effective ski jumping technique. For a long time, the trajectory of the skier jumper was deep “ballistic. But even with this unsafe jumping technique, the Austrian jumper Bradl flew to the 100-meter mark in 1936. The leaders in ski jumping, both in the Olympic Games and in the world championships for a long time were athletes from Norway. They were surprised by the manner of execution of the jump, making the torso tilt forward, arms out to the sides, and how to lie down on the air cushion formed. Long search coaches and scientists led to a further change of position of the body of the jumper in flight: the skier lies almost parallel to the skis, arms tightly pressed to the body. This style became known as “aerodynamic”.

In 1989, there was a revolution in the ski jumping sport. Jan Boklev, an athlete from Sweden, was the first in the world to use a new ski jumping technique: he began to move the toes of the skis to the sides during the flight, the style became known as V – shaped. This novelty in technology due to greater aerodynamic effect increases the range of the flight on the jumps by 10-20%. Nowadays this jumping technique is used by all the strongest ski jumpers.

Over the years, the rules of conducting and judging competitions, technology for measuring the length of the jump and issuing urgent visual information about the sports performance of athletes have changed. Since 1945 the jumps were evaluated not only by the length from the jump-off table to the landing place but also by the beauty and correctness of the jump. The competition program was also changing. In 1863, for the first time ever, a woman took part in the ski jumping competition in the second championship. Since 1964, the competition program has included jumps from 2 ski jumps – 70 and 90 meters. Twenty years later, in 1982, the individual events were complemented by team events on the large ski jump. In the 1990s, the design capacity of the ski jumps reached 90 and 120 meters respectively.

In recent years, women’s ski jumping has become increasingly popular. In 2006, women ski jumpers, mostly from North America, succeeded in getting the FIS women’s event included in the 2009 World Championships in Liberec.

On May 26, 2006, the International Ski Federation decided to allow women to compete in ski jumping at the 2009 FIS Nordic World Ski Championships in Liberec, Czech Republic. At that event, the title of the first-ever world champion in women’s ski jumping was won by Lindsey Wan of the United States.