SAPPORO – Hideharu Miyahira put the icing on the cake on Monday when he captured his third ski jumping title in as many days at the HBC Cup.
Looking to add to the HTB and STV titles he won at the weekend, Miyahira led after a first effort of 117 meters before landing the day’s longest jump of 139.5 meters on the K-120 Okurayama hill to secure his first HBC title with 256.7 points.
World Cup teammate Noriaki Kasai had jumps of 102 and 120 meters to claim second place with 196.1 ahead of Yusuke Kaneko, who nailed leaps of 106.5 and 115 meters for third on 195.1 points.
Elsewhere, Kazuyoshi Funaki produced another dismal performance and finished way back in eighth while Masahiko Harada was ninth and Hiroki Yamada 13th.
Teen takes title
SAPPORO (Kyodo) The 14-year-old snowboarder Kazuhiro Kokubo outclassed a strong field in the men’s halfpipe final to win his first Japan Cup title on Sunday.
Kokubo earned marks ranging from 8.2 to 9.3 on the Makomanai Big Pipe course in Sapporo and accumulated a total of 43.3 points, good enough to see off Takaharu Nakai, a fifth-place finisher in last February’s Salt Lake City Olympics.
Nakai had 41.4 points and Fumiyuki Murakami was third with 38.3. Domu Narita, who won his first World Cup title in Canada last month, put in an error-strewn performance and had to settle for fourth with 37.2 points.
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