Eurovision Sport is delighted to announce that it is distributing media and marketing rights as well as host broadcasting a pioneering new joint men’s and women’s edition of the FIS Ski Jumping World Cup event at Rasnov, Romania from 18 to 20 February, 2021.

Previously, men’s and women’s events were held separately in Rasnov, with the men’s event joining the FIS World Cup circuit for the first time in 2020.

This year’s event will mark the start of Eurovision Sport’s four-year renewal of its media rights partnership with the Romania Ski Biathlon Federation. The agreement, which runs until 31 March 2024, also covers commercial rights.

Promoting gender equality in sport is an integral part of the new agreement between Eurovision Sport and the Romania Ski Biathlon Federation.

The World Cup event will be accompanied by a Zoom debate entitled ‘The Present and Future of Women’s Ski Jumping’, involving a panel of top athlete, race official and broadcast representatives, comprising:

• Sarah Hendrickson: Olympian, World Champion, female representative of Athletes’ Commission for FIS
• Chika Yoshida: Race Director, FIS Women’s Ski Jumping World Cup
• Gregor Peternel: Head of Sports, RTV Slovenia
• Host - Elsa Arapi: Women’s Sport Lead, Eurovision Sport 

The debate, which is expected to spark some lively exchanges, will involve a discussion on the evolution of women’s ski jumping and the challenges it still faces, and will aim to pinpoint the areas requiring focus in order to drive further growth for the sport.

It will take place on Wednesday 17 February at 4pm CET, and will be available to view via the following link: https://zoom.us/j/97694034514

EBU Members that traditionally broadcast Ski Jumping World Cup events are showing strong commitment to Rasnov 2021. They are: TVP (Poland), ZDF (Germany), NRK (Norway), ORF (Austria), YLE (Finland) and RTVS (Slovenia). NHK, the Japanese public-service broadcaster, will also cover the event.

Rasnov 2021 will, for the first time, include a Mixed Team event on Saturday 20 February. Mixed Team ski jumping is set to make its Olympic debut at next year’s Winter Olympic Games in Beijing, China.

Runar Østmo, Chair of the EBU Sports Committee, said: ‘Gender equality is at the core of Public Service Media and the promotion of sport. We see huge potential in having both genders competing at the same World Cup event and at the same venue, in a format which has long been successfully established in sports such as biathlon’.
Dan Mihoc, President of Romania Ski Biathlon Federation, said: ‘We are very much looking forward to the first event of our continued cooperation with Eurovision Sport and are expecting to keep the same gender-balanced ski jumping event in the future in Romania’.

The joint Rasnov 2021 World Cup event and ‘The Present and Future of Women’s Ski Jumping’ debate form part of Eurovision Sport’s continuing commitment to gender equality in sport.

This is complemented by the publication by Eurovision Sport of a new media handbook: ‘Reimagining Sport: Pathways to Gender-Balanced Media Coverage’. In a foreword, Glen Killane, Executive Director of Eurovision Sport, writes: ‘Promoting women’s sport is perfectly aligned with our values. As public service media, it’s part of our mission to reflect all the communities we serve and some of the most inspiring work of our Members springs from this sense of responsibility’.