Did the qualifiers get to the final based on their own achievements only, or did they get help from other runners through either co-working or following? Grouping of runners is always a hot topic at the major orienteering champs. The below analysis of the results regarding runners running in packs from the WOC Long Qualifier is done by Henning Spjelkavik as a part of a work done on separation methods in orienteering (read more about the work here) – and the way to display the material is inspired by methods shown by Martin Lerjen for WOC 2007 results.
Note! Colored boxes in the below figures show that two runners have been within 15 seconds of each other at a control. Being within 15 seconds of each other does not necessarily mean that the runners get help from each other for the orienteering or to keep up higher speed – but if two runners are within 15 seconds of each other in a large part of the course, it indicated that at least one of the runners has gained time due to the grouping. These types of graphs are especially interesting in order to find out how effective separation methods are in orienteering.
The EOC Long Qualification was fast with some technically challenging parts (see map extract). Many runners did some smaller errors, but still the gap from the winner to the last qualifier in each heat was as low as 3.49 in one of the mens heats – and below 5.30 in all of the mens heata.
Winners in all the three mens heats had around 55 minutes for 10.9 kilometers – giving a pace of around 5 minutes/kilometer. The best women run 40 minutes for around 6.5 kilometers.
Statements
Some statements and personal Blog entries from the Long Qualification (will be updated with more):
Øystein Kvaal Østerbø: - Today the Long distance Qualification was held in a partly very detailed area north of Ventspils. I did a stabile run, and tried to orienteer well without pusing the maximum speed. My only bigger mistake was the 15th control where I passed the control flag with a few meters without seeing it, and lost 45 seconds. My result was a 13th place, 3 minutes behind the winner in my heat Matthias Merz. [read more (with map)]
Martin Johansson: - Var lite sliten sen gårdagens två race och kände mig lite stel i baksida lår. Försökte hålla ett högt tempo utan stress och fast jag klantade mig redan på 1:an och missade en 40 sekunder uppskattningsvis så behöll jag lugnet. En del små kontrollmissar och i morgon krävs mer noggrannhet. Kom på att jag skulle ta stopp på någon sekund … [read more]
Sandy Hott: - [...] following and otherwise cooperating are two of the most common ways of gaining time unfairly in orienteering today. Some may consider that this is just “part of the game”, but as following and co-operating are explicitly against the rules, I consider it as cheating. [...] But in my mind, the responsibility is largely on the runners to show respect for their competitors by “playing fairly” and competing according to the rules as best they can. [read more]
Thea Lillehov: - This morning I was nervous all ready when waking up. Usually this is a good sign, but today it wasn’t. I was getting more nervous every minute so I just longed for the start. It started really good, a long leg to the first controll and everything worked fine. The control sat where I wanted it to be, a good start. Longer leg also to nr.2 and then the misery started. First I overlooked the possi … [read more]
Karin Leonhardt: - der dritte Streich…Schon als wir heute vom Bus ausstiegen und zum Vorstart gingen dachte ich wow das Gelände sieht echt schön aus. Flach und der Boden wie in Skandinavien – mosig, weich und mit viel Heidelbeerkraut. Auch meine Stimmung vorm Start war gut und ich war viel weniger nervös als gestern. Als es dann los ging war es mein Ziel für heute ruhig zu bleiben, immer einen Plan zu haben un … [read more]
IOF World Cup news: - No top names missed out on qualification today but Andrey Khramov (Russia), bronze medallist yesterday, was only a few seconds inside the necessary qualification time in his heat. Times were close especially in the men’s heats, with the final qualification placers being only 4.06, 3.49 and 5.25 respectively behind the winners.[read more]
Emiliano Corona: - Questa mattina gara di qualificazione per la Long Distance: purtroppo nessun italiano in finale, distanziati dal tempo utile per entrarvi dai 2 in su. Gara che presentava lunghe tratte dove fondamentale era la direzione alternate ad altre più tecniche dove contava la lettura fine: in conclusione una bella gara, dove però era importantissimo correre sempre molto forte. Penso che come squadra non … [read more]
Alessio Tenani: - Anche la qualificazione della gara a lunga distanza è stata tiratissima: ho corso in 1h0213, a 656 dal vincitore della batteria, il Campione del Mondo Matthias Merz, e a 250 dal limite per laccesso in finale.Dopo la tirata per il primo punto, ho corso bene fino ai 40 di gara; alcune imprecisioni nel finale.Risultati e intertempi. … [read more with map]
De Laatste Post: - A lot of runners (like Merz) had some problems on their way to the second control. Baptiste Rollier was in the lead nearly the whole race. But at the finish Matthias Merz had the best time. [read more]
Matthias Merz, Erik Öhlund and Pasi Ikonen won the three mens heats, whereas Anne Margrethe Hausken, Emma Engstrand and Signe Söes won the three womens heats. No big surprises in todays EOC Long Qualification – most of the big favorites went to the final.
Results
Men Heat A
1 Merz,Matthias SUI 55:17
2 Rollier,Baptiste SUI 55:26
3 Weltzien,Audun Hultgreen NOR 55:43
[18 Ozolins,Janis LAT + 04:26 / NQ]
Men Heat B
1 Ohlund,Erik SWE 55:22
2 Nordberg,Anders NOR 56:26
3 Troeng,Mats SWE 56:28
[18 Muller,Matthias SUI 04:04 / NQ]
Men Heat C
1 Ikonen,Pasi FIN 54:51
2 Hubmann,Daniel SUI 55:48
3 Johansson,Martin Per SWE 55:58
[18 Duncan,Jon GBR + 05:26 / NQ]
Women Heat A
1 Hausken,Anne Margrethe NOR 42:24
2 Persson,Lina SWE 42:51
3 Brozkova,Dana CZE 43:55
[18 Whitehouse,Pippa GBR + 06:39 / NQ]
Women Heat B
1 Engstrand,Emma SWE 41:05
2 Weltzien,Ingunn Hultgreen NOR 42:35
3 Korzhova,Natalia RUS 44:17
[18 Abzalone,Zanda LAT + 10:06 / NQ]
Women Heat C
1 Soes,Signe DEN 40:16
2 Ryabkina,Tatiana RUS 40:23
3 Johansson,Sofie SWE 40:58
[18 Brodmann,Ines SUI + 07:09 / NQ]
Some who did not make it who normally should have been in the A-final:
18 Muller,Matthias SUI 59:26 + 04:04
19 Fraser,Scott GBR 59:31 + 04:09
25 Omelchenko,Yuri UKR 1:01:10 + 05:48
18 Duncan,Jon GBR 1:00:17 + 05:26
19 Troan,Hans NOR 1:01:17 + 06:26
18 Whitehouse,Pippa GBR 49:03 + 06:39
19 Wild,Angela SUI 49:36 + 07:12
20 Mackenzie,Mhairi GBR 50:07 + 07:43
21 Bridle,Helen GBR 53:48 + 12:43
18 Brodmann,Ines SUI 47:25 + 07:09
Also notably: Francois Gonon and Minna Kauppi where on the startlist, but did not start today.
The Qual was actually more interesting than the Final seen from a routechoice perspective – at least there were several choices for many of the legs. Here you see a comparison of routechoices along with running time for some of the most interesting legs in the EOC Sprint Qualification. The top three runners have chosen different routes for many legs – but running time for the different route choices are usually within a few seconds.
For each case, click the map sample to zoom in. If you have any comments to the routechoices, please leave them in the comment section below each leg.
There were not many interesting routechoice alternatives in the EOC Sprint Final 2008, but still it is interesting to see where the fight for the medals was won. Below you see routechoices compared for the top runners in both the Women and Men EOC Sprint Final 2008.
For many legs, all runners have approximately the same route choice, and running speed seems to have been the most important factor. Feel free to make your own analysis, and add it under the comments for each leg.
Click to maximize size of map sample. See also full split times for all men and women.
The EOC Sprint Final was flat and fast – and the orienteering was a bit more challenging than in the qualifications, which was said to be very technically easy. Winning times were in the low end for sprint – the fastest women Anne Margrethe Hausken running the 2.6 kilometers long course in only 11.11 – whereas Emil Wingstedt took home the victory in the mens class with 13:11 in 3.3 kilometers.
The courses
There were not many tricky routechoices in the courses – in several of the longer legs the optimal routechoice was quite obvious. An example – the longest leg in the womens A-final – the second leg. The blue line shows the part of the leg were there is no route choice whatsoever,
However, there were some tricky parts which cost some of the favorites a few seconds – and there were changes between different types of orienteering and different terrain types which challenged the runners. Below you see a few of the most tricky legs with the routechoice of Mikkel Lund (from Mikkel Lund homepage). Mikkel Lund denotes the course as “a nice sprint course with many changes during the course”.
The rest of the Mens EOC Sprint Final course is shown at the end of this page. A link to the womens course is also provided.
Results
A big day for Scandinavia, with the five first women from Norway, Sweden and Finland (3!) – and three of the first six men also from Sweden (2) and Norway. Anne Margrethe Hausken celebrated her first individual championships medal since 2005 – whereas Wingstedt is back where he was in 2006, as the King of Sprint!
Some statements and personal Blog entries from the Sprint Final (will be updated with more):
Anne Margrethe Hausken: - Aiaiai, this tasted extremely well. [Hausken personal webpage - read more (Norwegian)]
Emil Wingstedt: - I have a good capacity for running. I am also good technically in this kind of orienteering. [...] I also want to do well in the rest of the races. [IOF World Cup news - read more)
Anne Margrethe Hausken: - I was careful when it was difficult, and ran fast when I could do that [IOF World Cup news - read more]
Celine Dodin: - This was not the afternoon that I was dreaming about… [Dodin personal webpage - read more (French) - including analysis of interesting legs in the courses in both final and qualification]
Mikkel Lund: - 5-4-16 er mine resultater i de seneste 3 EM-sprinter inklusiv dagens finale. Mange havde måske lugtet medalje, men den må vente lidt endnu. Hvis jeg havde lykkedes 100 % idag kunne jeg have kæmpet om en podieplacering og måske også bronzemedaljen, men jeg er egentlig rimelig godt tilfreds. [Lund personal webpage - read more including map with routechoice (Danish)]
Martin Johansson: - Ja vad ska man säga, vart inte alls som jag tänkt mig i alla fall. Men det är nog nästan bara suveränen Wingstedt som kan säga det. Småmissar och tveksamheter gjorde att jag stressade och tappade kontrollen över mitt lopp på flera ställen. Kan räkna ihop till misstag på de klart flesta kontrollerna. Ett snetryck av banan gjorde det inte lättare. Var riktigt förbannad på mig sjä … [read more]
Damien Renard: - I did much better on B-final than on qualification and get 3rd place. It was a fast and pretty easy sprint. I have to improve quite a lot on easy sprint in order to be competitive. It is small details (like 5sec mistakes) who makes ranks on top 10. I am use to run more technical sprints because I like it more but I can wait to get the perfect sprint to perform. So, I need to get better on those pretty easy sprints. I have pretty good team mates in KOK (Daniel for sure) who can teach me a little more about the way to get faster on this kind of races. Physical aspect is very important of course but I think technical aspect is important too…. [read more]
Thea Lillehov: - My goal with the b-final was to get more experience with two sprint competitions on the same day. I did not ran at 100% speed, but I tried to run fast without getting too tired. I think I succeded in this, the speed was okay and afterwards the legs were still very okay. Actually they felt better in the noon than in the morning. I did one mistake in the open-air museum which costed me 20 seconds, for the rest it was ok. The two controls directly after the spectators control were a bit tricky or maybe I did not read the control description well enough, because I did not except them to be placed so low… [read more]
Ivan Sirakov: - I made it only for a 14th place into the B-final. I ran the 3.3k course for 14:49, and the winner from SWE – Anders Holmberg – 13:16. There were some misses from the organizers on the map and that cause my first mistake about 20secs. After that I made two more mistakes all together about 20-25secs maybe. It was quiet hard for me to run it under 14mins as the several runners did. Emil Wingstedt w … [read more]
Karin Leonhardt: - Mit Lauf im B-Finale war nicht so brilliant. Die schwierigen Posten meisterte ich ganz gut aber bei einem der einfachsten (schon Posten 1-2) hatte ich ein kurzes Blackout und zweigte in die falsche Straße ab. Schade… … [read more]
Emiliano Corona: - Questa mattina i Campionati europei sono entrati nel vivo con la qualificazione della gara sprint. Un tracciato molto veloce e non particolarmente insidioso mi ha visto distaccato dal vincitore di batteria Smola di 159; batteria a dir poco spaventosa: ho corso molte gare, ma è la prima volta che dei concorrenti rimangono fuori dalla finale A prendendo solo 32 dal primo arrivato della propria bat … [read more]
Video with interviews from EOC Sprint 2008 – provided by the EOC organizers:
Enjoy the below video from EOC Sprint 2008 – provided by the EOC organizers. It shows the terrain – from sand dunes to parks – and also the best runners in action. (Note especially a crash between two runners after about one minute).
Gold for Emil Wingstedt (SWE) in EOC Sprint distance! Daniel Hubmann (SUI) and Andrey Khramov (RUS) are in the next spots.
Wingstedt is the king of sprint – with 2 WOC Gold medals and 3 EOC Gold medals over the Sprint distance. Last year at WOC Wingstedt was pushed down from the sprint-throne by Gueorgiou in Kiev – but Wingstedt is now again at the top. See his profile at World of O Runners.
Results:
1 Emil Wingstedt, SWE 13:11 +00:00
2 Daniel Hubmann, SUI 13:25 +00:14
3 Andrey Khramov, RUS 13:35 +00:24
4 Scott Fraser, GBR 13:37 +00:26
5 Lars Skjeset, NOR 13:43 +00:32
6 Peter Oberg, SWE 13:44 +00:33
7 Mats Haldin, FIN 13:45 +00:34
8 Oystein Kvaal, NOR 13:46 +00:35
8 Thierry Gueorgiou, FRA 13:46 +00:35
10 Martins Sirmais, LAT 13:48 +00:37
Swiss Orienteering Federation: Hinter Emil Wingstedt (SWE), der zum vierten Mal Sprint-Europameister wurde, gewann Daniel Hubmann eine weitere Silbermedaille. Nachdem der Schweizer bis zum 14. der 19 Posten vorn gelegen hatte, büsste er bis zum Ziel 14 Sekunden ein. Bronze ging an den Russen Andrey Khramov. Matthias Müller erreichte den 11. Platz …[read more (German)]
Gold for Anne Margrethe Hausken (NOR) in EOC Sprint distance! Heli Jukkola (FIN) and Helena Jansson (SWE) are in the next spots.
Hausken har previously a Silver medal from the sprint distance in WOC in Japan in 2005, a Gold medal from NOC 2005 in Norway and a Bronze medal from EOC in Hungary in 2002 as her best results. See all previous results in her profile at World of O Runners.
Unofficial results:
1 Margrethe Hausken,Anne NOR 11:11 + 00:00 0
2 Jukkola,Heli FIN 11:14 + 00:03 0
3 Jansson,Helena SWE 11:17 + 00:06 0
4 Kauppi,Minna FIN 11:39 + 00:28 0
5 Rantanen,Merja FIN 11:40 + 00:29 0
6 Brozkova,Radka CZE 11:44 + 00:33 0
7 Gustafsson,Linnea SWE 11:46 + 00:35 0
8 Johansson,Sofie SWE 11:53 + 00:42 0
9 Vinogradova,Galina RUS 11:58 + 00:47 0
9 Soes,Signe DEN 11:58 + 00:47 0
Minna Kauppi, Heli Jukkola and Helena Jansson won the three womens heats, whereas Michal Smola, Emil Wingstedt and Jamie Stevenson won the three mens heats.
Only 7% behind to get to the final in mens class – between 10% and 13% in womens class. Lower figures than in recent chamionships – probably due to quite easy orienteering.
Several excellent runners missed the final in the mens class – maybe due to quite easy sprint? Some of these were Jarkko Houvila (FIN), Valentin Novikov (RUS), Olav Lundanes (NOR), Audun Hultgreen Weltzien (NOR), Damien Renard (FRA), Seline Stalder (SUI), David Schneider (SUI), Anders Holmberg (SWE), Graham Gristwood (GBR), Claus Bloch (DEN), Baptiste Rollier (SUI).
Success for Sweden – 10 of 11 to the final.
Damien Renard: I am a little sad because I was running well and had to face 2 maps imperfections but I was not clever enough to see them. It was an entrance on a fence to control 6 which was difficult to see on the terrain. I entered the forbidden garden instead. Between controls 9 and 10, it was a big tent (permanent) missing on the map. I had a bad direction out of the control 9 and I ran 50m souther than control 10. …. [read more and see his map].
Mikkel Lund: The first final is, for my part, secured in this year’s European Championships in Latvia. [...] Today I was number 9 in my heat in a sprint with focus on running. [ read more (Danish) and see his map ]
Ivan Sirakov This morning it was the first race of EOC – sprint qualification and the final is afternoon. I made few mistakes – about 15secs and missed the final for 3 seconds. I wasn`t able to push it as hard as I want but still it was not a disaster. I will run the B-final at full speed and hope to make it better. [ read more and see his map ]
Martin Johansson: - Stabilt kvallopp med 90 % insatts. Försökte hålla igen lite med löpningen och inte ta ut det lilla extra utan att försöka ha kvar det till finalen. Aningen efter i kartläsningen, särskilt inledningsvis och tvekade på flera ställen. Missade på ett vägval till 4:an då jag inte såg en öppning. Annar … [read more]
Christian Teich: - Nun bin ich in Lettland angekommen. Das Modelevent versprach sehr viel für die bevorstehenden Wettkämpfe. Leider lief es in der Qualifikation zum Sprint nicht so gut wie erhofft. Es war eher ein sehr einfacher Sprint und ich versuchte on Anfang an Druck zu machen. Ich kam auch bis Posten 10 ganz gut durch. An Posten 11 kontrollierte ich nicht noch einmal die Richtung und rannte auf den f … [read more]
Karin Leonardt Insgesamt lagen (wahrscheinl auch wegen des relat. einfachen Geländes und sehr vielen überhaupt fehlerfreien Läufen von vielen Wettkämpfen) die Cuts für das A-Finale viel niedriger als auch schon. Waren es bei der EM vor zwei Jahren bei den Frauen zum Beispiel im Durchscnnitt 17% (je nach Heat sogar bis zu 24%) die man sich erlauben durfte lag heute der Cut zwischen 10% und 13 % Rückstand hinter der Siegerzeit (bei den Herren beide Male im Durchschnitt 7%). [Read more (German)]
David Schneider: - Heute hat die EM in Ventspils (Lettland) mit dem Sprint begonnen. Auf der recht einfachen Bahn gelang mir ein guter Start. Erst am viertletzten Posten passierte die Katastrophe: Auf dem kleinen Verschieber in einem Park verwechselte ich das Häuschen an dem der Posten stehen musste mit einem Stein. So habe ich zwischen den vielen Spielgeräten und Sitzbank nach einem Stein Ausschau gehalte … [read more]
Map from Qualification
Map with Mikkel Lund’s course to be found at Mikkel Lund homepage (click on image below to get complete map):
Video
Photo: Jānis Urtāns and Daiga Brakmane – official EOC2008 photographers
Are you an elite orienteer? Or interested in the future of orienteering? Please use 5 minutes of your time to fill out a questionary about separation methods in orienteering provided by a work group set up by the Technical Committee of the Norwegian Orienteering Federation. The questionary has already been distributed to national team members through the national team trainers, and is now extended to a broader audience. The intended audience is elite orienteers on all levels – and others who have special interest in the matter.
Background: The Technical Committee of the Norwegian Orienteering Federation feel that co-working, and to some extent following is a major problem in orienteering. Together with IOF we are going to look into different methods for separating runners to prevent or reduce following, co-working and collaboration during orienteering events.
Over the years many different ways of separating runners have been proposed, e.g. “butterflies”, one-man-relay, micr-o, etc. However, there has been little formal evaluation of how effective the different proposals are, and how effective they are relatively to each other.
16.05: Giorgio Di Centa Novità di primavera Cari amici sportivi, anche il finale di stagione è trascorso nel segno della sfortuna! Nelle ultime gare del minitour di Falun in Svezia, ne ...
16.05: Maurice Manificat Montée du Grand Ballon 2012Comme lannée dernière, je vais prendre le départ de la Montée du Grand Ballon, jeudi à Willer-sur-Thur en Alsace, comptant pour la Coupe de Fra ...
15.05: Maurice Manificat Programme printemps 2012Voici mon programme pour ce printemps : Jeudi 17 mai : Coupe du Monde et Coupe de France de course en montagne à Willer-sur-Thur (Alsace) - La mont ...
15.05: Justyna Kowalczyk Cenny sparingpartnerWe wtorek zakończyło się pierwsze tej wiosny zgrupowanie Justyny Kowalczyk. Nasza zawodniczka ćwiczyła przez dwa tygodnie na lodowcu Dachstein. ...
14.05: Petter Northug Knuste verdens sterkeste mann!Petter Northug vant kampen mot verdens sterkeste mann og sikret gode inntekter til Redd Barna – alt på samme sted i helgen.I helgen gikk konkurra ...
13.05: Remo Fischer Trainingsbeginn, MallorcaIn der letzten Woche absolvierte ich bereits wieder das erste Trainingslager mit der Mannschaft. Wir waren in Mallorca und fuhren jeden Tag Velo, da ...
13.05: Anna Haag Cykling och paj.SUMMER CAMP info, klicka här. Som Emil skrev var vi ned till Lugano i två dagar, nötte mil efter mil på racern. Helt underbara mil. Jag ville ba ...
13.05: Sprintgutta Nytt ritt gjennomførtØystein er flink til å spore opp ritt, og enda bedre på å dra oss andre med på de han finner. I d ...
13.05: Helena Ekholm GöteborgsvarvetBer om ursäkt för dålig uppdatering den senaste veckan, tiden har bara sprungit iväg. Mycket med husbygge, bokslut i företag och resor kors och ...
12.05: Curdin Perl Hasta la vista amigosDas Training ist seit dem 1. Mai nun voll im Gange und ich konnte schon die ersten Highlights verbuchen. Zuerst mal das Trainingslager in Mallorca m ...
12.05: Kris Freeman After a great vacation in Hawaii I got back to worAfter a great vacation in Hawaii I got back to work with five solid days of training. Then I flew to Park City to continue testing new insulin proto ...
12.05: Emil Jönsson Vänja kroppen. Ett lyxigt problem!Oj tiden rullar på och lika så gör träningen! Känns skönt att nu har kommit in i träningsrutinerna igen med dubbla pass, vila, mat, stretch, ...
11.05: Carl Johan Bergman Avslutning av semester och start på ny säsongNu har jag packat ner verktygen för en stund och letat fram träningsutrustningen på allvar. Visst har jag rört på mig sista tiden men det högt ...
11.05: Jesper Modin ToppturEn sjukt fin dag i Gränsen! Vindstilla, strålande sol och någon minusgrad. Idag blev det en långtur med skateskidorna. Jag, Hellner, Teo, Richie ...
11.05: Justyna Kowalczyk Bez różnicyJustyna Kowalczyk od tygodnia przebywa na pierwszym tej wiosny zgrupowaniu przygotowującym ją do startów w nowym sezonie. Wraz z trenerem Aleksan ...
10.05: Anna Haag Milano över dagen..Härom dagen tog vi bilen ner från bergen, via schweiziska Lugano till Milano. Frukost hemma, lunch i Lugano, middag i Milano, kvällsfika hemma. A ...
09.05: Emil Jönsson Anna&Emil Summer Camp!Hej på er! Då var inbjudan klar och vi kan glädjande välkomna er till årets höjdpunkt, Anna&Emil Summer Camp i samarbete med Hello Sweden! ...
09.05: Maurice Manificat Reprise de lentrainementNous sommes au mois de mai, cest le temps de la reprise du chemin de lentrainement pour tout le monde (tous les skieurs nordiques) comme on aime si ...
Did the qualifiers get to the final based on their own achievements only, or did they get help from other runners through either co-working or following? Grouping of runners is always a hot topic at the major orienteering champs. The below analysis of the results regarding runners running in packs from the WOC Long Qualifier is done by Henning Spjelkavik as a part of a work done on separation methods in orienteering (read more about the work here) – and the way to display the material is inspired by methods shown by Martin Lerjen for WOC 2007 results.
Are you an elite orienteer? Or interested in the future of orienteering? Please use 5 minutes of your time to fill out a questionary about separation methods in orienteering provided by a work group set up by the Technical Committee of the Norwegian Orienteering Federation. The questionary has already been distributed to national team members through the national team trainers, and is now extended to a broader audience. The intended audience is elite orienteers on all levels – and others who have special interest in the matter.