Construction point

The construction point (German: Konstruktionspunkt), also known as the critical point, calculation point, calculation line, K-point and K-spot, is a line across a ski jumping hill which indicates the hill's steepest point in meters. It was formerly used to classify the size of a ski jumping hill, and to calculate the number of points granted by a given jump. Since mid-2004, the hills are instead measured in hill size.

Overview of a ski jumping hill

Letalnica Bratov Gorišek in Planica, Slovenia. The critical point is marked with a horizontal line at the top of the red vertical line, while the line at the bottom is the hill size point.

Classification

Class	Construction point	Hill size[1]
Small hill	<45	<50
Medium hill	45–74	50–84
Normal hill	75–99	85–109
Large hill	100–169	110–184
Ski flying hill	≥170	≥185

For a jump on the calculation point, the athlete gets 60 points. For every meter short or beyond this mark the jumper receives fewer or more points. For example: On a K 120 hill (Calculation point 120 m) the meter value is 1.8 points. So a 122 m jump would be worth 63.6 points, a 118 m jump only 56.4 points. The distance points plus the judges marks result in the total score.

Nearly all competitions in the FIS Ski Jumping World Cup use large hills with a critical point between 120 and 130. The largest is Mühlenkopfschanze in Germany. In addition, there is a bi-annual FIS Ski-Flying World Championship, which is held in one of the world's five ski flying hills: Vikersundbakken in Norway, Letalnica Bratov Gorišek in Slovenia, Čerťák in the Czech Republic, Heini Klopfer Ski Jump in Germany and Kulm in Austria.[2] In the FIS Ski Jumping Continental Cup, and FIS Women's Ski Jumping Continental Cup, both normal and large hills are used. In the Winter Olympics, there is one competition in the normal hill, one in the large hill, and a team competition in the large hill.

Scoring

Ski jumping competitions are based on a point system which combines points for length and style. For hills up to large, the scoring system grants 60 points to jumps which reach the critical point.[3] For ski flying hills, 120 points are granted for the critical point length. Based on the hills length, distance points are calculated, which is added for each meter beyond the critical point and subtracted for each point shorter than the critical point. A meter has more distance points in smaller hills.[4]

Distance points[4]

Calculation point	Distance points
20–24	4.8
25–29	4.4
30–34	4.0
35–39	3.6
40–49	3.2
50–59	2.8
60–69	2.4
70–79	2.2
80–99	2.0
100–169	1.8
>170	1.2

References

1. "The International Ski Competition Rules (ICR)" (PDF). International Ski Federation. Archived from the original (PDF) on 6 November 2013. Retrieved 14 March 2017.
2. Berkutschi.com. "Ski flying". Archived from the original on 7 July 2011. Retrieved 11 February 2011.
3. Berkutschi.com. "Calculation point (K-point)". Archived from the original on 7 July 2011. Retrieved 11 February 2011.
4. Berkutschi.com. "Distance points". Archived from the original on 7 July 2011. Retrieved 11 February 2011.