Four Hills Tournament

• The tournament consists of four ski-jumping World Cup events.
• It has taken place annually around New Year since 1953.
• The venues are Oberstdorf, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Innsbruck and Bischofshofen.
• The first two hills are in Germany, the next two in Austria.
• The order of the venues has remained unchanged since 1972/73.
• Individual results and an overall ranking make the series one connected competition.

The Four Hills Tournament is one of ski jumping's best-known highlights. It links four venues over a few days, taking spectators from the opening event in Oberstdorf through the New Year's competition in Garmisch-Partenkirchen to Innsbruck and Bischofshofen. Unlike a single World Cup event, the tour tells a story across several stops: a strong jump matters, but the overall standings reward performance across the entire series.

The order has remained the same since the 1972/73 season. Oberstdorf usually opens the tournament on 29 or 30 December. The New Year's Day event follows at the Great Olympic Hill in Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The tour then visits Innsbruck's Bergisel ski jump, usually on 3 or 4 January. The Three Kings' Day event in Bischofshofen concludes the tournament on 6 January. The exact dates of the first and third events depend on the day of the week.

Each venue has its own character and spectator traditions. The Schattenbergschanze in Oberstdorf opens the series; Garmisch links sport with the turn of the year; Innsbruck's striking Bergisel stands above the city; and Bischofshofen hosts the final event. For athletes, distance is only part of the result: judges' style marks count alongside jump length.

The tournament traditionally uses a knockout system. In the first round, qualified jumpers compete in pairs. The winner advances directly to the second round, joined by the highest-scoring losing competitors, known as lucky losers. This adds tension to the opening jump without diminishing the importance of distance. Points from all four events are combined for the tournament standings.

The idea for a four-hill series arose in 1949 among members of the ski clubs in Partenkirchen and Innsbruck. A precursor was the New Year's event in Garmisch, which had already been held since 1921/22. The first Four Hills Tournament took place in 1953. Weather can affect the schedule: when an event has been cancelled, a jump has sometimes been made up at another venue. The tour is therefore a connected sporting contest, even though it spans four locations.

Alongside the Winter Olympics and the Nordic World Ski Championships, the tournament is one of ski jumping's major competitions. To learn more about the discipline, see our guide to ski jumping, including its hills and competition format. The tour is a distinctive example of events in skiing and sits alongside the Nordic World Ski Championships in the international calendar.