The long distance at the Junior World Championships has the longest start of all international championships in orienteering – this year stretched for more than 6 hours, including the delay of 40 minutes. There is no qualification and there are no limits, as all runners can take part; therefore, the competition is huge and choosing the right starting group may be crucial in order to succeed. When the event is held in the northern hemisphere it is usually a choice of milder temperature against possible tracks in the forest made by the early starters. Usually the best ones still prefer the end of the field; however, considering the fact that many countries have up to 6 medal contenders in each category, the excitement is kept high through the whole day.
Ida does it again
While most of Europe experiences the hot weather, the Northern coastline of Jutland offered perfect conditions with only 17-20 degrees Celsius. Adding an interesting coastal terrain with challenging and tricky courses makes it a perfect combination for orienteering.
A queen of the JWOC 2009 has reserved herself this unofficial royal title also this year. Today, Ida Bobach won her third Junior World championships’ gold medal and also defended the long distance title from last year. With the gold medals from the EYOC 2008 and several Junior European Cups, she is now the most famous of the successful Bobach family. “The constant changing of orienteering technique made it quite difficult. Some tricky controls with focused orienteering were followed by long trail-running parts. On the way I made a few smaller mistakes and had to stop to avoid any bigger loss of time, which proved to be a good tactics. Actually I felt tired and didn’t have my usual extra gear, which was frustrating.” She took the lead already at the second control and never let it go, with Tove Alexandersson 1 second after at the 4th control being the closest ever (see the map). With 7 medals in her collection, Ida Bobach still has 2 races left in this championship and another JWOC next year.
For the silver medallist from Sweden Therese Klintberg it was a good race with only one small mistake, “It was pretty tough terrain, but I kept fighting the whole way.” Unlike for Ida, this was the first JWOC for Therese, which started with a very solid 13th place in the sprint earlier this week. The Finnish Sari Anttonen also took her first ever JWOC medal, with 15th place from the sprint in Italy as her best individual result until midday today.
Results Women
1. Ida Bobach, DEN, 1:01:55
2. Therese Klintberg, SWE, 1:03:46
3. Sari Anttonen, FIN 1:04:24
4. Signe Klinting, DEN, 1:05:45
5. Monika Gajda, POL 1:05:50
6. Fiona Kirk, SUI 1:06:00
Pavel Kubat – a surprising champion
His first JWOC was the one in Italy last year, where he climbed highest in the sprint reaching 20th place. In the long distance last year he was only 52nd. In the sprint this year he was 28th, and even though it’s right to say that every participant is a potential medal contender, a few would consider him a favourite for today’s race. Even if you look back to the EYOC 2008 in Switzerland, he wasn’t higher than 27th there. However, he’s now the newest junior World champion!
It wasn’t a perfect race for Pavel, however, he was never more than 31 second behind the leader. Until the butterfly it was more or less a battle of four: Pavel Kubat, Johan Runesson, Matthias Kyburz and Eskil Kinneberg, however, right after it was only Runesson who remained in a close run with Kubat. At the 17th (see the map) they had an equal time, then Kubat took the lead, but only for a short while as a mistake at 22nd allowed Runesson to take over… for two controls only – almost 1.5 minute longer time to the 24th was too much to keep the gold in hands. After that Pavel Kubat never let it go.
Much of today’s fame was taken by Olle Boström of Sweden, who was heading the result list for most of the day. As an early starter he finished 8 minutes ahead of the previous leader showing a great time, which seemed to be hard to beat. Hard, but not impossible, as later in the afternoon he was overtaken by 5 other runners. Silver and bronze went to Johan Runesson and Matthias Kyburz accordingly.
Results Men
1. Pavel Kubat, CZE, 1:18:48
2. Johan Runesson, SWE, 1:19:32
3. Matthias Kyburz, SUI, 1:20:48
4. Eskil Kinneberg, NOR, 1:20:58
5. Rasmus Thrane Hansen, DEN, 1:22:09
6. Olle Boström, SWE, 1:22:41
The middle distance qualification comes next on Thursday after a well deserved rest day.
Splitsbrowser for the long distance
Junior World Orienteering Championships 2010
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