Aalborg’s sunny and calm summer morning provided an ideal setting for some outstanding performances at the “grand finale”, the relay, of JWOC 2010. Under a cristal blue sky an unique type of Danish hilly terrain with many valleys was awaiting the teams.
Sweden and Norway fight head a head
All eyes were on the Swedish men this morning at the start. In the ealier races this week the Swedish men, who were also the relay title defenders, already won 4 medals. The competition however was strong. What to think, for example, about the Norwegians, Danes, Czech and French?
Sweden, Norway and Denmark took the lead after the first leg. Sweden’s Olle Boström, the bronze medalist of yesterday’s middle distance race, changed over 8 seconds ahead of Norway’s Gaute Hallan Steiwer, the fresh World Champion in middle distance. Denmark followed as third, 30 seconds behind.
Sweden staid in the lead and with a small margin of 11 seconds ahead of Norway, Gustav Bergman sent Johan Runesson into the forest for the final leg. Was this the chance for the Swedish men to grab the first gold medal of this JWOC? Denmark dropped a few places back in the intermediate ranking and Switzerland’s Matthias Kyburz was leading the pack of pursuing teams 2:11 behind.
“I felt strong all way long” Johan Runesson commented after the finsh. “I made a little mistake just before the spectator control and pushed as hard as I could to catch up the time loss” he continues. At the spectator control the difference between Vegard Danielsen and Runesson was about 20 seconds. Norway’s anchor man however won the fight and brought home another victory for Norway. “It is fantastic to finish the championships in this way” a proud and cheerful Frode Balchen (Norway’s junior coach) commented. Sweden finished second 1:04 behind. Denmark was third after an impressive run by Rasmus Thrane Hansen who climbed up from the 8th to the 3rd position after his start in the final leg.
Results Men
1. Norway
2. Sweden +1.04
3. Denmark +5.29
Domination by Danish women
“It was really hard in the hills” Emma Klingenberg commented after her race. The Dane was able to send her fellow country-woman Ida Bobach into the forest for the second leg with a lead of 24 seconds. Russia changed over as second, over 3 minutes ahead of the other teams. The Swiss girls passed as 3rd, but were disqualified a leg later due to a mispunch of Bettina Aebi, and thus not able to defend their title.
Ida Bobach continued Denmarks’s good trend in the second leg. Bobach changed over with quite a large gap of almost 5 minutes ahead of Sweden’s Therese Klintberg. Klintberg leads a pack of 5 pursuing teams.
Signe Klinting secured an impressive victory in the relay, 3.12 ahead of Czech Republic. Sweden was in the race for a silver or bronze medal but lost the chance after several small mistakes by Sweden’s anchor woman Tove Alexandersson. Tereza Novotna brought home the silver medal 28 seconds ahead of Russia’s Anastasia Trubkina.
Results Women
1. Denmark
2. Czech Republic +3.12
3. Russia +3.40
Junior World Orienteering Championships 2010
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I believe Frode is Norways coach -certainly not Denmark’s (that’s Lars Lindstrøm)??
Thanks for you comment, the correction has been proceeded. Hopefully no confusion anymore.
Best regards!
I strongly beleive that V.Danielsen was in the lead all the way from the spectator controll to the finish. He got a gap of 20 sec just before passing the arena, and this gap was just increasing until the finish line.
@ Confused 2: This was reported by the Swedish Federation, interviewing Runesson.