Mostly a central-European (GER/AUT/SUI/CZE/POL) + Norway/Finland/Japan thing, but still cool:
Known to Germans and Austrians as the "Vierschanzentournee," the Four Hills ski jumping tournament is a Yuletide tradition like no other. DW's André Leslie tells you all you need to know about the mysterious event.
If you come from the US, it's Thanksgiving football, and if you are from Australia, it's the Boxing Day Test. I'm talking about famous sports events with a long tradition that are scheduled in and around the holiday season. Win or lose, the main thing is, they are just there in the background every year, forming part of what is (hopefully) an enjoyable holiday season with the family. Or maybe, depending on your family, an excuse to leave the dinner table.
For Germans and Austrians, the Four Hills ski jumping tournament is part of Christmas and New Year like Glühwein and sugared almonds. Sure, not everyone in Germany or Austria owns a huge, long wide pair of skis and likes to dress up in a neoprene suit, but everyone can appreciate the art of jumping off a huge height. It's a sport of millimeters, of perfect timing, of luck - not to mention the wind factor. This is the responsibility of the coaches at the bottom of the mountain, the guys holding the little flags: we'll come back to this later.
Still, despite the round-the-clock-reporting in Germany, the Four Hills tournament remains a bit of a mystery to the English-language world. The website of the event is completely in German and doesn't even bother offering the normally standard English language subpage with only half the content. Even the event preview on the International Ski Federation (FIS) website is written in overly-enthusiastic, broken English.
It's no surprise really. A quick look over the winners list from the last 62 years, produces only a handful of Americans and Canadians. Not even Eddie the Eagle won it. Instead, its winners come from countries like Norway, Finland, Austria and Germany, with the odd standout from Japan.
story continues ...
http://www.dw.de/what-on-earth-is-the-four-hills-tournament/a-18149100...
One of the sports where we repeatedly beat the friggin' Germans ...
