WC Overall to Niggli&Kyburz: Maps and Results

[With analysis] Simone Niggli crowned her fantastic orienteering career with victory in today’s World Cup final sprint race in Baden – which also gave her the overall World Cup 2013. Matthias Kyburz in the men’s class did like Niggli: Won the World Cup final and the overall World Cup in front of an ecstatic home crowd.

Simone Niggli needed help to win the overall World Cup today. Even with a victory, Tove Alexandersson would take the big prize if she managed to catch the second spot. Already from the start of the race it was clear that Niggli was doing her part of the job – the question was if she would get any help.  Help came from within her team: Judith Wyder showed quite early that she had a good day, and run an excellent race finshing second, 16 seconds behind Niggli.

In the end also Emma Klingenberg beat Alexandersson, and after the race a very disappointed Alexandersson sat in the finish area watching Niggli celebrate her big victory – her tactical choice of skipping the middle distance not having worked out. Alexandersson had 20 seconds up to the second spot – 20 seconds away from the overall World Cup victory. Alexandersson is however only 21 years old, and will get a new chance already next year.

Illustration: Niggli was celebrated in Baden (Photo: TV-broadcast)

Slow start – fantastic finish

In the men’s class the overall World Cup was almost decided ahead of the final – with a normal race Matthias Kyburz would take the victory. Kyburz had a relatively slow start – fighting hard to get ahead of Martin Hubmann. At the first radio control they were nearly equal, but in the last part of the race nobody was even close to Kyburz.

Kyburz’s finish along with his stability has become his biggest strength – just as it was Emil Wingstedt when he dominated international sprint orienteering some years ago.

Analysis

A quick analysis/LiveBlog of the course was made at World of O’s Facebook page during the race – the illustrations from this analysis is reproduced below. Note that the illustrations are from the women’s course, but except for an extra part in the middle, the legs and challenges are mostly the same. Also, the quick analysis is done without official split times, so there might be some interesting surprises when the splits are available.

To the first control left (red) is a bit longer, but you avoid the stairs, so it is clearly faster. Most men went left – in the women’s class it was more evenly divided.

To number 3 the rightmost (red) choice is the shortest and fastest – but the green is not much slower (Öberg run this – having a good time in the first part of the course).

This is probably were Alexandersson lost her chance for the overall World Cup (but wait for the official splits to be sure). Both Alexandersson and many other go right (red). It is only a little bit longer, but going down and up again costs several seconds extra. Many runners went into this “trap” of the course setter.

From 7-8 left is a bit shorter and with less curves – and is thus probably some seconds faster.

From 11-12 the rightmost routechoice (red) is the fastest – avoiding stairs, mostly with straight lines, and nearly the shortest. Going left (purple) looses quite some time. Peter Öberg did this after a very good start of the race.

Here going right (green) seems to be the best choice – not significantly longer than the alternatives, but avoiding stairs and corners. Niggli goes left and probably looses some time here. Martin Hubmann also goes left and looses some time.

Here left is probably the fastest – but Matthias Kyburz flies up the stairs on the rightmost route – probably having one of the fastest times of the day.

The only leg which is significantly different for the men. Here going straight through the light green is probably even faster than the alternatives drawn – of the drawn alternatives purple should be fastest.

Maps and GPS-tracking

• Map women and GPS-tracking women
• GPS-tracking men

Results

Women

1 Simone Niggli-Luder SUI 14:13 0:00

2 Judith Wyder SUI 14:29 +0:16

3 Emma Klingenberg DEN 14:35 +0:22

4 Tove Alexandersson SWE 14:49 +0:36

5 Sabine Hauswirth SUI 14:56 +0:43

6 Julia Gross SUI 14:57 +0:44

7 Ines Brodmann SUI 15:02 +0:49

8 Anne Margrethe Hausken NOR 15:10 +0:57

9 Nadia Volynska UKR 15:11 +0:58

10 Silje Ekroll Jahren NOR 15:12 +0:59

11 Heidi Østlid Bagstevold NOR 15:15 +1:02

12 Maja Alm DEN 15:16 +1:03

12 Lina Strand SWE 15:16 +1:03

14 Sara Lüscher SUI 15:28 +1:15

15 Sarina Jenzer SUI 15:29 +1:16

16 Ida Bobach DEN 15:31 +1:18

17 Rahel Friederich SUI 15:32 +1:19

18 Lilian Forsgren SWE 15:35 +1:22

19 Venla Niemi FIN 15:42 +1:29

20 Tone Wigemyr NOR 15:45 +1:32

Men

1 Matthias Kyburz SUI 13:19 0:00

2 Martin Hubmann SUI 13:41 +0:22

3 Jonas Leandersson SWE 13:43 +0:24

4 Daniel Hubmann SUI 13:46 +0:27

5 Fabian Hertner SUI 13:57 +0:38

6 Raffael Huber SUI 14:05 +0:46

7 Vojtìch Král CZE 14:07 +0:48

8 Jerker Lysell SWE 14:09 +0:50

9 Matthias Merz SUI 14:10 +0:51

10 Florian Howald SUI 14:11 +0:52

11 Magne Daehli NOR 14:12 +0:53

12 Andreas Kyburz SUI 14:13 +0:54

13 Frederic Tranchand FRA 14:16 +0:57

14 Oleksandr Kratov UKR 14:19 +1:00

15 Tue Lassen DEN 14:20 +1:01

16 Gernot Kerschbaumer AUT 14:21 +1:02

16 Peter Öberg SWE 14:21 +1:02

18 Lucas Basset FRA 14:22 +1:03

18 Gustav Bergman SWE 14:22 +1:03

20 Oskar Sjöberg SWE 14:23 +1:04

• Official results women and overall World Cup women
• Official results men and overall World Cup men
• Results and other information available here