MARTIN SCHMITT PREVIEWS THE FOUR HILLS TOURNAMENT

Who do you see as the favourite for the Four Hills?
For me, Dawid Kubacki is the main favourite but there are several guys who are pretty close to him but he is a bit ahead, in my opinion. You know at the Four Hills it comes down to self-confidence and the mental part. You need to have a good start in Oberstdorf, important to get a good result, get a good feeling over the training jumps to develop your self-confidence. You need to know that you can actually make it this year and you need to get this feeling jump-by-jump and then you can build up your self-confidence. That helps you in the competition to perform on the highest level.

Are there any younger jumpers who you think could make a name for themselves at the Four Hills and maybe this season?
Yes, there are several jumpers who are on their way to the top. Last season Daniel Tschofenig from  Austria showed up in the World Cup and this season he is doing pretty well - maybe not the consistency yet but he's for sure on a good way to be a really elite World Cup jumper.

What makes the Four Hills tournament so special and so different from their other events on the Ski Jumping World Cup calendar?
It's a different rhythm. Normally, you have week by week or weekend by weekend and you have a few days rest inbetween. But at the Four Hills it's one competition, one after the other, so you need to perform day by day. You cannot afford any mistakes in these eight jumps. It’s special, you have four different hills, you need to adapt quite fast on the different hills and of course it's the pressure all around – you want to use it to help you win it for sure.

But also all the media expectations, and the spectators’ expectations, the fantastic crowd and fantastic atmosphere in the stadium. It's special, and it's such a nice event. I'm really looking forward to this year and that we have spectators again at the Four Hills. It's really great to have this coming up. After all these years, it's still a very special event.

Many fans have been introduced to the sport through the Four Hills at Christmas time. Does this event help to grow the sport worldwide?
I think it's really important for our sport to have it at this special time of the year because you are normally at your home. You have time after the Christmas celebrations, a few days off, then it's nice to watch sport on television – you don’t need to do much, just sitting on your sofa and watch ski jumping. It's quite nice, but I have never experienced that because I was never at home!

What's your favourite Four Hills memory?
My favourite Four Hills memory is my victory in ’99-‘2000 in Oberstdorf because it was such an amazing competition. It was pretty close between Andreas Goldberger and me. It was such an amazing second jump. At the time all the jumpers had to jump from one gate. I think I  jumped for one record and then Andreas improved the hill record. I was in the lead after the first run, I knew I had to jump another hill record to be able to win it. I think the record before was about 125 and then we improved in this competition by seven metres or so. It was an amazing competition to win, it's such an exciting competition in front of your home crowd. It was just amazing.

Martin will be part of Warner Bros. Discovery's coverage of the Four Hills tournament, which will be available to watch on discovery+ (selected markets), Eurosport and Eurosport App from Thursday 29 December.