January 31, 2011 (Bischofshofen, Austria) – Austria’s Stefan Thurnbichler was a happy man on Sunday as he captured the victory following the second COC jump competition in Bischofshofen, Austria. Yet it was a Canadian ski jumper, Mackenzie Boyd-Clowes that attracted a great deal of attention with his fine 13th place performance.

Thurnbichler was second after the first round at the “Paul-Ausserleitner-Hill”, taking the win with jumps of 132.5m and 139.5m for a total of 272.1 points. “Simply great – winning at home is twice as nice,” said Thurnbichler.

Boyd-Clowes was happy with his jumping telling SkiTrax, ”I’m really pleased with my second jump, which was the 6th best of the round. I just need to put two of them together.” A common refrain from many jumpers his jumps of 124.5m and a strong 132.5m leap propelled him to an encouraging finish.

With 133m Felix Schoft from Germany was the leader after the first round of jumping and his 137.5m in the final was enough to finish second. It was the best COC result this winter for the 20-year-old. “Great weather, great hill, great competition. I’m very satisfied with my performance,” Schoft said.

Schoft’s teammate Maximilian Mechler (133m and 139m for  268.1 points) came in third. “The competition today was okay for me. It seems that we Germans just can’t win here in Bischofshofen.”

Andreas Stjernen was the best Norwegian in fourth, followed by Germany’s Markus Eisenbichler and Andreas Wank.

The Slovenian team also achieved good results today with three jumpers in the top 10 – Tomaz Naglic (7th), Robert Hrgota (8th) and Matic Kramarsic (9th).

USA Ski Jumping’s Chris Lamb also performed well in Austria, qualifying both Saturday and Sunday and scoring points. He finished in 25th place with jumps of 123 and 123.5 meters. ”I just have to put two of them together. This gives me a lot of confidence,” said Lamb.

Canada’s Eric Mitchell also took part in the competition and indicated that being on the tour week after week is important. “I’ve been lucky enough to be on the circuit with four competitions taking place in Germany and Austria. Competing in Europe has been challenging for me, and although my results were not as high as I had hoped for, I plan to use this as a step in the right direction.” Mitchell was 50th.

Canadian coach Gregor Linsig told SkiTrax that he couldn’t be happier. “I’m pumped,” he said, “Mackenzie surprised me a bit. He just got off a plane from Estonia and arrived late into the night – about 3 am – before the start today at 9am. With the long in run here I thought he was going to fall asleep, but he is turning into a great ski jumper.”

Linsig added that working with the US has been productive.

”it’s been a great trade-off working with the Americans this year. As small are our countries are in the ski jumping world, we need to help each other out as much as possible. Chris Lamb was a pleasure to work with. He has tremendous talent and a great future ahead of him.” Lamb has been improving almost daily as he scored points in three out of four events in the elite European field.

Coach Linsig and Boyd-Clowes will travel to Obersrdorf, Germany this week for ski flying, while US jumper Chris Lamb and his squad will prepare to attend the exciting COC jumping event in Iron Mountain, Michigan.

With files from FIS.