WUOC Middle: Ruairi Reports (again)
From Ruairi Short in Alicante:
“Today was the middle distance at WUOC with both Rosalind and I running.
We had a nice warm up map before the start today and it was great to have a little practice at the 1:10000 scale again. The area looked like it would be tricky and that’s exactly what it turned out to be like! It was mostly scattered low pine forest, but that means there were trees everywhere and maintaining a compass bearing was hugely difficult. This made for a tough time finding the controls in the circles and getting there any way efficiently.
Ruairi in the start box
I had a clean enough race but with a few misses, most notably on the
second last where my brain just wasn’t working anymore! I witnessed
the eventual winner Martin Hubmann from Switzerland doing his thing in
the terrain and could not fail to be impressed. The Belgian following
him looked wrecked!
In the end I was 66th (but out of 102 starters as opposed to 91 in the
long) with a time of 47:40. The top three in the mens were:
1 Martin Hubmann (Switzerland) 32:49
2 Zsolt Lenkei (Hungary) 35:10
3 Adam Chromý (Czech Rep.) 35:41
with full results available at
http://sd.ua.es/en/orienteering-championship/documentos/middle-results/resmiddlemen.pdf
On the women´s side of things, Rosalind was happy with her run today.
She had some small misses too but feels she minimised the time loss,
which other people did not do. This led to her improving on yesterday´s
result and coming 28th in 38:42 out of 80 competitors.
The top three saw some new medals given out and the locals were
delighted with the 3rd place result:
1 Lilian Forsgren, Sweden 29:39
2 Anna Forsberg, Sweden 31:38
3 Anna Serrallonga Arqués Spain 32:35
Full results can be seen at
http://sd.ua.es/en/orienteering-championship/documentos/middle-results/resmiddlewomen.pdf
Roz warming up
Rosalind departs for home today so she misses out on the relay
tomorrow. I am on second leg of a mixed team with ex-Irish resident Sören Reichers (Germany) on first leg and Tomasso Scalet (Italy) on last. Also Kieran will finally get to test the terrain in the coaches race!”
Friday is the final day of WUOC 2012 with the relay, closing ceremony and banquet. The relay kicks off at 07.30 (men´s) and 08.00 (women´s) Irish time, and you can follow the news here: http://sd.ua.es/en/orienteering-championship/competition.html
With some very tricky courses on tough terrrain, a high standard of competition, great effort on the part of the organisers, ample meals and a pool for recovering in the heat, it has overall been a really enjoyable event. WUOC 2014 will take place in Olomouc in the Czech Republic, so potential athletes can stick the start of August in their diaries for then!
Maps from the week:
Long (Men)
Sprint (Women)
Middle (Men)
