Georg Hettich of Germany won the ski jumping to lead the gold hunt for the Nordic combined individual at the Turin Winter Olympics in Pragelato, Italy Saturday.

Hettich led with 262.5 points after his two jumps on the normal hill, some 80 kms from the host city Turin.

Petter Tande of Norway was second, ahead of both Jason Lamy Chappuis of France and Jaakko Tallus of Finland, who shared the third place going to the 15km cross-country race.

Favorite Hannu Manninen of Finland only ranked eighth with 238 points. However, he was expected to make up ground in the cross- country, where he will start a minute and 38 seconds behind the leader.

"I have a very good chance now," Manninen said. "I will start my skiing not so fast because of the high altitude. I'll just try to concentrate on my own skiing in the first few kilometers and then go forward from there."

Manninen tipped ninth-placed Magnus Moan of Norway, 11th-placed Austrian Felix Gottwald and team mate Tallus as his biggest threats in the cross country.

Double world champion Ronny Ackermann of Germany only placed 26th after the ski jumping.

Source: Xinhua