Normal Hill, Individual, Women

Defending Olympic Champion Carina Vogt continued to dominate female ski jumping, winning the World title in both 2015 and 2017. Another prominent ski jumper was the young Japanese woman Sara Takanashi, born in 1996, who had been competing internationally since the age of 12. She won the overall World Cup four times, in 2013, 2014, 2016 and 2017. In the Olympic season, Norwegian Maren Lundby emerged as a clear favorite, winning 7 out of 10 World Cup competitions in the weeks before the Games. In the Olympic competition, Lundby took a 2.2 points lead in the first round over the German Katharina Althaus, with Takanashi in 3rd position and Althaus having the longest jump of the round, 106.5 m. In the final round, Lundby – in spite of reduced speed – made the longest jump of the day (110.0 m) and took the gold by a comfortable margin. Althaus secured the silver medal with a new good jump, with Takanashi holding third place. Defending champion Vogt ended up a distant fifth. Lundby ended her excellent season by winning the total World Cup by a large margin, winning 9 out of 15 competitions and never placing lower than third. Lundby made ski jumping history when, at age 14, she was selected for the first female ski jumping championships in Liberec 2009, starting as number one in the competition. She ended the competition placing 22 out of 36 competitors.