As for the previous days, it is in the cold mist that the young EYOC partitipants fighted for the medals – and in the warm sun that they could celebrate them. The sprint event closed nicely those three intense days of competition and saw for the first time after the Danish dominance of past days rather multicolored podiums, with victories for Czech Republic, Germany, Great Britain and Switzerland.
Emma Klingenberg (W-16) will however stay the big winner of these championships with two golds and one silver medal in the three competitions. She had to give in today to the 8 seconds faster Czech Tereza Novotna, who had achieved 6th place at JWOC sprint too. “I wanted to run without mistakes and I did”, Tereza told simply, still surprised to be ahead of her this time. In M-16 victory went to German runner Christoph Prunsche, respectively 2 and 5 seconds ahead of Piotr Parfianowicz (Poland) and Mate Baumholczer (Hungary). “It is a full surprise, I would have already been satisfied with a top-10 or even a top-15″, Christoph laughed and had still some difficulties to realize: “It’s incredible, I can’t believe it yet… incredible”.
Same kind of amazement faced the two M/W-18 winners. It was the first international success for Britt Kristian Jones, who explained it is his favourite discipline. He had however not been in the town before, even though this had been permitted in the last days. “I misspunched in long distance and didn’t finish, so I didn’t expect this victory at all”, Kristian said. Sarina Jenzer could celebrate a victory on nearly home ground in W-18 category. “It was a great feeling with the public, you know everybody at the start… I was very well prepared. I visited the city a lot and when looking at the map during the race, I was telling to myself “now you have to go to this shop… and then to this one”, she said in a smile. “I was a little surprised not to be nervous. I didn’t put any pressure on myself as I knew I was well prepared. Now I will need some time more to realize…”
The Nation’s cup went to Denmark, followed by Czech Republic and Switzerland. Next year’s EYOC (this time in early July) will be held in the Serbian Kopaonik.
> Photos sprint European Youth Orienteering Championships 2008
> European Youth Orienteering Championships 2008
Share with friends: 
Tweet this or 
Stumble this or 
Add to Delicious
