The Ski Jumping Center in Erzurum, Turkey, was fully destroyed by a landslide in July 2014. After 2.5 years, the reconstruction of the hills was now completed.

This Tuesday that Turkish team of head coach Pekka Niemelae was able to make the first jumps on the new facility. Video: First jumps in Erzurum

The first international competitions in the new Ski Jumping center will be two Continental Cups on the HS 140 on February 4th and 5th. Shortly after that, from February 14th to 17th, the four Ski Jumping competitions (two individual, two team) of the European Youth Olympic Festival will be held on the HS 109.

Video about the new Ski Jumping Center

Finn Pekka Niemelae, who was head coach in France and Finland before, is coaching the Turkish national team for a couple of years now and wants to further develop the sport of Ski Jumping in Turkey. And the team already achieved some success: Fatih Ipcioglu was the first Turkish jumper to score points in the COC when he was 26th in Vikersund (NOR) last December and Samet Karta won a FIS Cup competition in Brattleboro (USA) already in February 2015.

In order to get kids interested in the sport, Pekka Niemelae now plans to train former ski jumper Faik Yuksel to work as a youth coach there in the future.

Source: fis-ski.com