Jarl Magnus Riiber claims historic World Championship hat-trick in Planica

Jarl Magnus Riiber became just the second man to win three consecutive Nordic combined World Championship titles by battling to Normal Hill victory in Planica.

The Norwegian, 25, beat German star Julian Schmid to emulate the exploits of the great Ronny Ackermann and claim three gold medals on the spin.

Riiber, who won Olympic silver on the Large Hill in PyeongChang in 2018, racked up a distance of 103.5m to soar to the summit of the standings in the ski jump.

And he followed it up with a red-hot time of 24:36.3 on the ski to topple Schmid, a Beijing Olympic Large Hill silver medallist, by 19.4 seconds on Saturday afternoon.

Austrian ace Franz-Josef Rehrl bagged bronze as German Vinzenz Geiger’s poor jump – ranking 15th – cost him a medal in the Slovenian mountains.

Riiber is now a five-time world champion after grabbing both team and individual Normal Hill glory at the past three events in Planica, Oberstdorf and Seefeld.

And that saw him follow in the footsteps of Germany’s three-time Olympic silver medallist Ackermann, 45, who stormed to four consecutive world titles between 2003 and 2007.

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