After all, it is an outdoor sport: Meta-analytic evidence for negative associations between wind compensation points and round scores in ski jumping competitions

by Jakob Pietschnig, Marie Pellegrini, Junia Sophia Nur Eder, Magdalena Siegel

Wind conditions are well-known to affect results of ski jumping competitions. To alleviate effects of different head or tail winds and differences in inrun length due to jury or coaches’ decisions, the FIS (Féderation Internationale de Ski) has adopted a wind and gate compensation system since January 2010. However, the accuracy and fairness of the resulting compensation points are often questioned by athletes, spectators, and media commentators alike but have not yet been thoroughly investigated. In the present meta-analysis, we present evidence for systematic negative associations of wind points but positive associations of gate points with round scores across all World Cup and World Championship competitions of men in the ski jumping seasons 2016/2017 and 2017/2018 (k = 35 and 30, respectively). Moreover, our results indicate that absolute correlations between wind points and round scores increased in presence of larger wind point variability, thus indicating lower accuracy of compensation systems when conditions are more variable. Additionally, there was a trend for larger wind point malcompensations on larger jumping hills. Our results suggest that the current wind point compensation formula as well as gate factors should be reevaluated to prevent systematically biased point awards within and across competitions.