RELAY TEAMS are: Women – Rachel, Vanessa and Aislinn. Men – Simon, Julian and BJ. The women’s relay starts at 7.30pm Eastern Aus time, and the men’s at 9.30pm.
Julian and Aislinn, our two representatives in the long final, ran solidly for fine results.
Julian’s 30th follows on from his best ever 24th in the long last year, thus showing his consistency. Julian took 114 mins and was 19.36mins behind the winner. This performance shows that good results are possible in the long distance for those willing to put the hard kilometres in.
Aislinn was running at her 2nd WOC and first ever final and handled the pressure admirably. Her main time loss seems to have been in a too wide a route choice on the long leg. The winner took 75mins and Aislinn was 24 minutes behind.
My long final day started with quarantine at a school in Cudy, before we were taken (by army truck, of course) to the pre-start. My nerves were running very high, having never before run in a WOC final. It was exciting and also a little scary to be fitted with a GPS tracker and to be filmed at the start, where an electronic start gate let me out onto my course.
AISLINN’s report
“The terrain was similar to the long distance qualification, except with quite a few more contour features and some climb, making for a more interesting course. While there was still a great amount of tracks and vegetation changes, an extra challenge was posed by several deep creek networks crossing the map. The white areas on the map were still highly visible, but often had more cut timber and some slow undergrowth than the Qual.
I made sure to stick to my usual strategies, and got into a good rhythm right from the start of the course. I chose fairly conservative route choices, often taking track choices until the last moment, but made sure that I took advantage of them by running hard on the tracks. The first half to two thirds of the course was fairly clean, with just a small error on 5 where I lost maybe 45 seconds searching on the wrong side of the spur. I found out afterwards that my route choice on the long leg to 6 lost me some time; while I decided to go to the right and stick mostly to tracks, it was faster to go slightly left and cut through the clearer areas. The later part of the course saw me start to make some silly errors with my compass, as I began to feel very tired. On control 13 I lost around 2 minutes searching in a higher creek network, and then on control 15 I drifted off the hill to the left and had to come around to the control. The spectator run through was soon after, and it was a tough one! I would say it was roughly 800 metres long and complete with a nasty uphill section. It was a challenge to get out of oxygen debt to complete the small last loop, but I managed to get through it, making just one error on the last control. I had confused the finish chute with the spectator run through, so I ran away from the control! The atmosphere in the arena was fantastic with a full contingent of Aussie supporters cheering, as well as some New Zealanders. I had been winning the splits until the end, which I am told made for some exciting watching.
The women’s course played out much as everyone had expected, which was not so sad! The Swiss supporters were of course ecstatic to see Simone win. I ended up in 35th, which I am very excited about for my first final. Hopefully if I can continue to improve, I can get an even better result next year.
As Julian was a later starter, he sadly did not get as much air time as me, and we saw little of his GPS tracks on the screen. However, WiFi at the arena meant we could watch him online. He had very competitive route choices, often taking the same routes as Swiss Matthias Merz, who took the silver medal. He seemed to lose little time, with just a few seconds in some early control circles, and a small mistake at control 19. He ran very strongly to take out 30th place, and said that he was mostly happy with the result.”
Swiss super-star Simone Niggli displayed outstanding fitness to win her 19th World Title by about 90 secs! Middle distance champ Minna Kauppi was 2nd and Swede Annika Billstam was third.
Controversy occurred in the men’s when Swiss youngster Fabian Hertner was disqualified from a medal after mistakenly punching the women’s control at the 2nd TV & radio control. Although the controls were very close (41m), they had distinctly different numbers (43 & 60) and were on a 3×3 depression and a spring; the Swiss team did not lodge a formal protest.
Men’s winner was Norwegian young gun Olav Lundanes who also had won the WOC long in 2010. Australians will remember him as the star at Jwoc 2007 in Dubbo where he took gold in the middle and long and silver in the sprint and relay! Olav took 94.42 mins and had almost a 3 minute winning margin. Matthais Merz (Swiss) was a popular 2nd and Latvia’s Edgars Bettuks won the bronze, to add to his gold in the middle.
There are lots of maps and leg by leg discussions on the World of O site. The diversity of orienteering was again demonstrated with 6 different nations on each podium. The relays on Saturday should be super exciting.
Aislinn Prendergast starts at 7.43pm & Julian Dent at 9.17pm (Eastern Aus time) in LONG FINAL THURSDAY.
Edgar BertuksVanessa Round
Vanessa Round ran well in the technically demanding middle distance final to place 31st, her best ever WOC result. A late mistake of about 90 seconds in the control circle of no 13 cost her some positions but besides that she navigated well.
Comments relayed from Aislinn Prendergast: “Vanessa said her goal had been to run a very smooth race and to prevent making big errors. Instead of running risky route choices she decided to play it safe. She reported that the terrain was easier navigationally than the qualification, with large features such as knolls and depressions making it easier to know where you were at most points in the race. However, the terrain was exhausting with cut wood and mossy rocks covering almost the entire map. Both Vanessa and Lizzie Ingham said they found the race very physically challenging. Vanessa had a very smooth run until losing time on control 13. She said that she had stood on top of the cliff and hadn’t been able to see the control, running away to relocate and then back in again. ”
Finnish star Minna Kaupi took home the gold medal, as she did in the 2008 and 2010 middle distance championships. The home crowd favourite, Simone Niggli-Luder, made a huge inexplicable mistake by going from control 7 to control 15 but stormed around the course afterward to still make the podium in 5th.
Edgar Bertuks brought home Latvia’s first ever gold medal with a narrow 5 second win in the men’s class. He had previously a best place of 9th in the middle at WOC 2008 and was the first runner home on the first leg of Jukola this year, proving that he had good form. Reigning middle distance champion Frenchman Thierry Gueorgiou had to settle for 4th, but was thankful to be able to race after just recovering from a stress fracture. The fact that five different countries shared the six medals shows just how global orienteering has become.
Julian Dent and Aislinn Prendergast will be our representatives in the long final on Thursday night and then the Championships conclude with the relays on Saturday. You can look at the map and course and follow runners as they do the course via live streaming. For a small fee of about $5 you can also get live TV coverage, which features quite a lot of “in forest” footage plus glimpses of route choices via the map – well worth it.
Vanessa Round finished strongly over the last few controls to take 12th position in her heat and was three and a half minutes within the time needed. However she was our only qualifer. Susanne Casanova placed 17th, missing the cut by less than a minute and Aislinn Prendergast suffered an early mistake and never recovered. Simon Uppill finished 19th in a strong heat and unfortunately Murray Scown, in his first WOC run, injured an ankle.
Thanks to Aislinn for these insightful comments:
” The arena today was very picturesque, an alpine meadow with a great view across a road to the second last control. The final control was on a tunnel beneath the road with a punishing 200m uphill finish chute. The terrain was a lot different to the long distance, with the courses being mostly downhill and on steep slopes. Some areas were flat, with interesting depressions and knolls, while others were sheer-sided with little detail, and yet others were very intricate sections of cliffs, knolls and small gullies. It was much more difficult running, with moss-covered rocks and a lot of cut wood, even in areas marked white. The women had 4.2km and the men 4.9km.
Once again, I was the first starter, and my race was doomed from the start! Rushing out from the start triangle, I went to the wrong first control, and then lost four minutes trying to find the right one. I eventually relocated off a paddock to the west, but the damage was done and I had the difficult task of calming the nerves ahead of me. Luckily I hit the next four controls cleanly, but again came unstuck on a boulder in green. I was much too high, and wasted three minutes looking in the wrong places. Interestingly, many athletes lost time here, including Mari Fasting, who lost 9 minutes but still qualified, Simone Niggli-Luder, who lost a minute, and Vanessa, who lost 2 minutes or so. I managed a few more smooth controls before losing time on a dark green gully, and then a boulder in dark green. Overall, the run was very unsuccessful, and even my better legs were hampered by loss of confidence and a lack of planning.
Despite my own disappointment, it was fantastic to watch Vanessa qualify (quite easily!), and make up for her near miss in the long distance. Even with her error, she managed to take 12th place and run very strongly into the finish. Suzanne had a similar experience to myself, losing a lot of time on the first control, and also losing some time on the third last. Despite this, the legs in between were smooth and fast and she came very close to qualifying, in 17th.
We all held our breath and crossed our fingers when Simon ran in strongly to put himself in a tentative 15th place. Sadly, he was soon knocked out by qualifying Kiwi Ross Morrison and a few other athletes, pushing him into 18th. He lost a lot of time at the 4th control and some more time in other areas; however his later splits show that he also clawed back some time on the leaders in the later part of the course. His heat was very fast, with 15th place just 3 minutes down on the leader.
Murray fell victim to a treacherous limestone hole, and sprained his ankle very badly. He walked (hobbled?) back into the finish and was taken straight to hospital, where X-Rays thankfully showed no broken bones. It looked to be a very painful injury, however, and he will be getting around on crutches for at least the next few days.
Tomorrow the team will be watching Vanessa run her middle distance race, which seems to be on some nicer terrain than today. I’m a bit jealous to be honest, as training on the middle distance final maps seemed to be the most fun! Her start is at 12.21 (8.21 AEST).”
Julian Dent and Aislinn Prendergast were our qualifers today for the long final. The WOC long distance qualification was in typical Swiss “Mittelland” terrain and supposedly quite fast. Thus it was no suprise that times were quite close giving little margin for error. The men had 12.2km and the women 8.3km.
Comments from Aislinn:
Today four athletes ran the long distance qualification; Julian, Rachel, Vanessa and myself. The qualification was held on a map about 25km from Lausanne, on an extremely flat piece of land, with just one steep-sided creek running through the middle of the map. The map was crisscrossed by a dense network of tracks, and had very variable vegetation, with patches of light green being mostly young beech trees, patches of stripey green being nettles and raspberries, and dark green being generally firs with nettles between. Clearings with striped green were to be avoided at all costs; these generally consisted of head-high nettles with fallen / cut wood between. The white, open areas were quite runnable and very visible, and control sites were mostly small clearings, depressions, thicket edges and the occasional ride. The openness of some of the forest meant that the course was more interesting than many of us expected; instead of track routes being the only viable options, it was sometimes faster to go straight.
After being quarantined in the small town of Apples, I was the first Australian starter. I ran hard but took fairly conservative route choices to begin. I lost only a small amount of time on controls which I could see but not reach! Later in the course I took some straighter route choices and lost only a minute on control #13, on the end of a ride. I hit the ride and went left, into the striped clearing, while the control was to the right. I finished being irritated by my error but otherwise very happy with my run, and qualified 14th (although the winning Russian was the last starter and was given the wrong map, meaning she should not have run in my heat; this meant that there were 16 qualifiers in my heat instead of the traditional 15).
Rachel again came very close to qualifying, but sadly missed out. She reported feeling very tired and sluggish towards the end, a result of having been recently unwell. Vanessa ran a quick race, but a fast heat and a few errors put her out of the final. She will now turn her focus to the Middle distance, which is her speciality. Simone Niggli-Luder ran another great race to finish well clear of her rivals, while Minna Kauppi took top honours in her heat.
The Australian supporters then waited nervously for Julian to finish, and despite his quick splits we were still quite worried until the end! He ran a smooth race however, qualifying in an impressive 7th. The Swiss men were of course the ones to watch again, with Matthias Merz winning his heat, and the other two men easily qualifying. Olav Lundanes took out his heat, finishing right near the end.
Tomorrow (Mon evening – Tues am)should be an exciting day with the Middle Qualification races beginning from 1pm Swiss time. Start times are: Aislinn 1.11pm Suzanne 1.19 Vanessa 1.51 Murray 3.03 Simon 3.19. Add 7.5 hrs on for SA time and 8 hrs for eastern states.
Australia started WOC by getting two finalists at the sprint today. Julian Dent was the best with 32nd, while David Brickhill-Jones was 39th.
Dent lost 30 seconds at the first control but picked up after that for a solid result, if not quite what he would have hoped for. Brickhill-Jones, returning to Australian colours this year, qualified by the narrowest possible margin, then started well before losing some time at the end.
There were three near-misses in qualifying, with Simon Uppill missing out by four seconds – men’s qualifying, on a relatviely simple course, was so tight that in one heat 35 seconds behind the winner was not enough to qualify – and Rachel Effeney and Susanne Casanova both falling about 15 seconds short. The latter was a decent debut performance and augurs well for her chances of qualifying for the middle distance final later in the week.
At the front end of the field, it was a Swiss sweep of the men’s medals through a trio of Matthiases – Kyburz, Merz and Muller – whilst Simone Niggle-Luder overwhelmed the field to take her 18th career gold medal.A notable Southern Hemisphere result was Lizzie Ingham’s 9th, the best ever by a New Zealander.
The Junior World Championships wrapped up today with the relay and wins to the Russian men’s and Danish women’s teams. The Australian men finished as the 10th official team and the Australian women in 24th.
Ian Lawford did a great job on the first leg for the men’s team finishing safely in the pack of main contenders before handing over to Oscar McNulty who probably had the run of the day to set Olle Poland off on the last leg fighting for a podium position. In the end the team finished 10th just over a minute off a podium position. The New Zealanders looked in contention for another medal with World Champion from the middle distance, Matt Ogden, setting off in 4th place, however he could not repeat his outstanding form from the previous day and the team finished in 8th place.
The Australian women ran consistently but never challenged the leading teams to finish in 24th.
Men’s Relay
1st Russia 93.10
2nd Denmark 94.13
3rd Norway 94.57
10th Australia 98.05
Women’s Relay
1st Denmark 94.05
2nd Sweden 94.20
3rd Switzerland 97.19
24th Australia 123.21
Matt Ogden wins first ever Gold for NZ! Ian Lawford 27th.
Okay, I know this is the Australian Orienteering home page but I’m sure that Aussie orienteers are also very excited by the outstanding success of 19 year old New Zealander Matt Odgen in winning the middle distance championship! Matt started mid-field and had an excruciating wait to see whether later starters would beat his time. Matt’s success wasn’t totally unexpected as he is a third time JWOC team member and did well in all races in 2011 finishing 15th (middle), 21st (sprint) and 30th (long). The Kiwis have a strong group of top orienteers at the moment and they will finish high up in the country team category at these championships. As one Kiwi wrote on their forum: “to borrow and modify a phrase from Thierry The Great, “no longer will the Scandinavians laugh when they see NZ on the starting list.”
On the Aussie front Ian Lawford had a solid run to finish 27th in the A final, thus adding to his 20th from the sprint. WA’s Oscar McNulty came through with a pleasing 3rd place in the “C” final, after not being totally healthy earlier in the week. There were 47 starters in that race. Michele Dawson again had a really classy result to finish 17th in the “B” final. The Championships conclude with the relays on Friday.
Ogden Matt NZL 27:55.9
Petržela Jan CZE 28:08.5 0:12.6
Schneider Florian SUI 28:09.2 0:13.3
Hann Nick NZL 30:50.8 2:54.9
Lawford Ian AUS 31:24.3 3:28.4
Men “B”
Diener Lukas SUI 26:35.0
Robertson Tim NZL 28:44.6 2:09.6
Dewett Magnus DEN 29:01.5 2:26.5
Morrison DuncanNZL 32:27.1 5:52.1
Gregory Kasimir AUS 33:37.6 7:02.6
Nankervis BrodieAUS 34:31.9 7:56.9
Paterson Liam NZL 35:32.8 8:57.8
Poland Oliver AUS DNS / DNF
Men “C”
Baudot Remi FRA 24:05.9
Gillet Julien BEL 25:37.7 1:31.8
McNulty Oscar AUS 25:57.7 1:51.8
Batin Ryan NZL 28:08.5 4:02.6
Massey Alex AUS 28:33.6 4:27.7
Women 3.6 km
Alexandersson Tove SWE 23:42.5
Sandberg Frida SWE 24:35.6 0:53.1
Mueller SandrineSUI 25:30.1 1:47.6
Robertson Laura NZL 28:45.0 5:02.5
Women “B”
Klysner Cecilie Friber DEN 23:19.6
Ivanova KristinaBUL 24:29.5 1:09.9
Poirot Delphine FRA 24:32.8 1:13.2
Dawson Michele AUS 28:06.6 4:47.0
Saville Cosette NZL 29:01.9 5:42.3
Anderson Sarah NZL 29:53.3 6:33.7
Metherell Selena NZL 30:19.5 6:59.9
McMillan Jula NZL 30:24.3 7:04.7
Muir Heather AUS 31:47.3 8:27.7
Burrill Lilian AUS 33:34.4 10:14.8
Buckerfield Amy AUS 46:40.7 23:21.1
Ian Lawford a brilliant 6th in JWOC middle qualifying heat.
Ian Lawford’s sixth place was the highlight in the middle distance qualifying and puts him in a fantastic start position in the final. Ian has been showing good form and looks set for another good result after his earlier 20th in the sprint. Ian stated: “Lost a bit if time early on an then sloppy through the last ones. Lost maybe 1.20 or so all up so I thought I was going to be pretty borderline qualifying.” With only the top twenty runners in each heat qualifying through to the “A” final it was especially difficult for the men, having fields of at least 60 in their heats. NSW’s Gregory Kasimir was unfortunate to miss the cut, placing 22nd and just 30 seconds behind the mark. Nevertheless his was a great run. Eighteen year old Michele Dawson had her best run of the carnival finishing 23rd and 90 seconds from the magical 20th place, to be our highest placed girl.
It had been hoped to have 2 or 3 more runners progress through to the “A” final but it wasn’t to be. Those placed 21-40th will compete in the “B” final and those from 41nd and above take on the “C” final. All useful races to further their international experience and to gain more form and confidence before the relays on Friday. The New Zealanders had some outstanding performances with two boys and a girl making the top 20. (The Jwoc blog has again been updated.)
Yet another Tasmanian has shown their prowess on the international stage with rookie team member Brodie Nankervis doing well to finish 40th, and the first Australian, in the tough JWOC long distance event. Ollie Poland, Oscar McNulty and Ian Lawford all improved on their places from last year with solid results in the first half of the field. Queenslander Heather Muir was our best girl. It was a day that produced many DNF’s, including 19 in the men, so it was pleasing to see that all our runners pushed through to the finish.
The outstanding result of the day was the success of Canadian junior Emily Kemp, who won the bronze medal, in what is the first World Championship medal for that country. This was not totally unexpected as she had been placed 12th in this event last year, and had run a good WOC relay leg in 2011. The New Zealanders also had some great results, especially in the boys, with three in the top thirty.
A fantastic breakthrough performance by Ian Lawford, of 20th, was the highlight for Australia in the opening event, the sprint, at the Junior World Championships. Being within a minute of the winner was an outstanding result for Ian, who has spent the last few months in Scandinavia training and competing. WA youngster Oscar McNulty and ACT’s Ollie Polandwere both within 90 seconds of the Russian victor.
The races were held in the city centre of Kosice, the second largest city of Slovakia in hot conditions. It was a typical urban map but navigation was made harder by many spectators making the laneways harder to see. The Nordic countries dominated with 4 out of 6 medals and 13 within Top 20. There was another stand-out feat by Sweden’s Tove Alexandersson, as her gold medal made it JWOC medal no 18 for this accomplished orienteer! Jwoc numbers are growing – there were 176 starters in the men’s race and 140 in the women.
MEN
Tikhonov Gleb Russia 14.05,7
Petržela Jan Czech Republic 14.23,0 0.17,3
Kinneberg Eskil Norway 14.23,4 0.17,7
Ogden Matt New Zealand 14.43,0 0.37,3
Lawford Ian Australia 14.59,1 0.53,4
Robertson Tim New Zealand 15.15,0 1.09,3
McNulty Oscar Australia 15.32,8 1.27,1
Hann Nick New Zealand 15.35,3 1.29,6
Poland Oliver Australia 15.43,6 1.37,9
Batin Ryan New Zealand 15.57,5 1.51,8
Gregory Kasimir Australia 16.00,7 1.55,0
Morrison Duncan New Zealand 16.10,0 2.04,3
Massey Alex Australia 16.29,4 2.23,7
Nankervis Brodie Australia 16.56,6 2.50,9
Paterson, Liam New Zealand DSQ
WOMEN
Alexandersson ToveSweden 11.12,8
Klingenberg Emma Denmark 11.45,3 0.32,5
Sandberg Frida Sweden 12.06,9 0.54,1
Robertson Laura New Zealand 13.10,5 1.57,7
Saville Cosette New Zealand 13.54,1 2.41,3
McMillan Jula New Zealand 13.54,1 2.41,3
Metherell Selena New Zealand 14.06,7 2.53,9
Muir Heather Australia 14.27,9 3.15,1
Burrill Lilian Australia 15.08,5 3.55,7
Buckerfield Amy Australia 16.49,5 5.36,7
Anderson Sarah New Zealand DSQ
Dawson Michele Australia DSQ
Program for coming events, with Slovakian time:
Monday: Long – 09:00 – 16:30
Wednesday: Middle Qualifying – 10:00 – 13.00
Thursday: Middle Final – 9:00 – 14:00
Friday: Relay – 10:00 – 13:00
Long Terrain description
“The Kosice karst terrain is mostly very runnable compared to the extreme variants you find in parts of Slovenia or Croatia. However, the semi open and dense areas can be very tricky – so the orienteering should be very interesting. On the slopes of the depressions there are rocky fields and cliffs. There should be both route choice options and tricky short legs in the courses.” World of O.
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