Coach Maciej Maciusiak has indicated that Piotr Żyła may also join the team, depending on his performance in a training session on Friday.
This year's prestigious Four Hills Tournament, which concluded on Tuesday, was not successful for Polish ski jumpers. The best of them was Tomasiak, whose steady and decent performance was a positive surprise, offering some hope for the future of the in-transition Polish team.
The rising teenage star, born in 2007, scored a top-10 place in two of the four events making up the German-Austrian tournament, and he ultimately finished 12th overall.
Things didn't look so good for the rest of the Polish team, though. Kamil Stoch was 19th, Maciej Kot 25th, Paweł Wąsek 35th, Dawid Kubacki 43rd, and Piotr Żyła 60th. It is also worth noting that Stoch and Żyła are 38 years old, Kubacki is 35, Kot is 34 and Wąsek is 26 - so for most of Poland's top six jumpers, the current season might just as well be the final one of their career.
The most successful of the Poles, Kamil Stoch, has already announced that this will be the case with him. After the final competition of this year's Four Hills Tournament in Bischofshofen, he received a small Golden Eagle with the inscription "Thank you, Kamil!" from the organizers - in recognition of his illustrious career, including three triumphs in the Four Hills Tournament in 2017, 2018 and 2021.
Most of the world's top ski jumpers are now heading to the Polish mountain resort of Zakopane, where two more World Cup events are scheduled for Saturday and Sunday. This group includes the Four Hills Tournament champion Domen Prevc of Slovenia, who won the 74th edition with a clear advantage over Austrians Jan Hoerl and Stephan Embacher. Prevc is also the clear leader in the overall World Cup standings - he has been on the podium in each of the last 12 competitions, and in Zakopane he may equal the historic record of Finland's Janne Ahonen, who finished in the top three 13 times in a row in the 2004/05 season.
Few top jumpers missing from Zakopane star-studded line-up include all top Japanese ski jumpers, including Ryoyu Kobayashi and Ren Nikaido, who are second and third in the overall standings, respectively. They decided to take a break after the Four Hills Tournament - and their absence could be exploited by German Philipp Raimund, who is right behind them in the ranking, as well as the following Slovenian Anze Lanisek, and Austrian Daniel Tschofenig, who won in Bischofshofen.
Returning to the Poles, 18-year-old Kacper Tomasiak is the country's biggest hope for home turf success in this weekend's events in Zakopane. He has been in consistent form this season, having already placed in the top ten of World Cup events four times. He finished fifth twice - on December 7th in Wisła and two weeks later in Engelberg, Switzerland. On Sunday, supported by the home crowd at the Wielka Krokiew Ski Jumping Hill in Zakopane, he will have the chance to stand on the podium for the first time in his career.
The first World Cup competition in Zakopane took place on January 26th, 1980, but the town only became a permanent fixture on the World Cup calendar in the 21st century, following the outbreak of Adam Małysz's stardom. In 2002, the Zakopane competition was attended by a record-breaking crowd of over 100,000 fans.
Austrian Gregor Schlierenzauer and Stoch have triumphed most often in Zakopane, with five wins each, and have reached the podium six times. Adam Małysz has won four times, most recently in the 2010/11 season, after which he retired. Hautamaeki and Austrian Stefan Kraft have won three times in the capital of the Polish Tatra Mountains.
On Saturday, qualifications and the duet competition are scheduled to be held in Zakopane, while Sunday will be the day of the main event - the individual competition.
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Source: IAR, PAP