World of O News
Swedish success in tricky World Cup Midde distance in Idre Fjäll: Max Peter Bejmer and Tove Alexandersson won the World Cup Middle distance on home ground in the Swedish mountains in a race where we saw a lot of big mistakes by top runners. Bejmer won ahead of three (!) other Swedish runners – Anton Johansson, Gustav Bergman and Emil Svensk, while Swiss Simona Aebersold took the second spot in the women’s race ahead of French Cecile Calandry.
Just like back in 2021 when we wrote that we probably hadn’t seen a race with that many mistakes from top runners and so many changes in the top since the epic WOC relay in France back in 2011, the Idre Fjäll area again proved to be a perfect area for a tricky Middle distance race. The highlight for the viewers – but probably not for the runners – was the 8th control in both the men’s and women’s courses where many runners really struggled: a medium long leg in slight uphill terrain in white forest with very few details. The problem was that the forest is quite dense with low visibility – and that even if the forest looks completely featureless on the map, there is something happening there from around two-thirds into the leg which made many runners turn around and start searching.
The safe choice – which some of the most successful runners of the day chose (see for example Gustav Bergman’s route below), was to run slightly higher up to get a good attack point. Below you can see part of the carnage on the 8th control in the men’s and women’s courses.
Analysis Men: Max Peter Bejmer with strong finish
Max Peter Bejmer had a slow start and strong finish at Thursday’s long distance race – and had exactly the same pattern today. With mistakes at the three first controls he was more than a minute behind after a few minutes of running, and then used the rest of the course to get closer and closer to the lead. The lead changed a lot throughout the race, with Lucas Basset (France) being in the lead until the third control (Kasper Fosser, Norway was in the lead in the start, but took a wrong 3rd control and was disqualified), Mathieu Perrin (France) then took over until the 6th control, Gustav Bergman then took over to the 11th control, Emil Svensk took over until the 17th control, then Anton Johansson had the lead for one control until Max Peter Bejmer finally took the lead a few controls before the finish.
Below you can see a graphical representation of the race:
And here the top 4:
And finally including some of the runners who did big mistakes:
Below you can see the main mistakes of the runners in the Top 8:
Analysis Women: Alexandersson again
In the women’s class Tove Alexandersson again had the highest speed and caught up with both Simona Aebersold and Andrine Benjaminsen (Norway) after they made mistakes on the 8th control – and everything looked like another big victory for Alexandersson. However, mistakes towards the end of the race for Alexandersson made the battle for victory tight and interesting after all, with Alexandersson taking the victory less than half a minute ahead of Aebersold. The only woman in the top with a clean race was Cecile Calandry, who took a strong 3rd place with a top technical performance. See the graphical race analysis below.
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Below you can see the main mistakes of the runners in the Top 8:
Maps and GPS-tracking
GPS-tracking:
Map men:
Map women:
Results
Men
| 1 | Max Peter Bejmer | 35:16 | 5:48 | ||
| 2 | Anton Johansson | 35:29 | +0:13 | 5:50 | |
| 3 | Gustav Bergman | 35:42 | +0:26 | 5:52 | |
| 4 | Emil Svensk | 35:44 | +0:28 | 5:53 | |
| 5 | Quentin Moulet | 36:19 | +1:03 | 5:58 | |
| 6 | Mathieu Perrin | 36:57 | +1:41 | 6:05 | |
| 7 | Lucas Basset | 36:59 | +1:43 | 6:05 | |
| 8 | Sigurd Paulsen Vie | 37:05 | +1:49 | 6:06 | |
| 9 | Lukas Liland | 37:28 | +2:12 | 6:10 | |
| 10 | Viktor Svensk | 37:34 | +2:18 | 6:11 | |
| 11 | Timo Sild | 37:43 | +2:27 | 6:12 | |
| 11 | Isak Jonsson | 37:43 | +2:27 | 6:12 | |
| 13 | Touko Seppa | 37:57 | +2:41 | 6:15 | |
| 14 | Martin Regborn | 38:05 | +2:49 | 6:16 | |
| 15 | Tomas Krivda | 38:10 | +2:54 | 6:17 | |
| 16 | Albin Ridefelt | 38:26 | +3:10 | 6:19 | |
| 17 | Aaro Aho | 38:29 | +3:13 | 6:20 | |
| 18 | Fabian Aebersold | 38:37 | +3:21 | 6:21 | |
| 19 | Daniel Hubmann | 38:38 | +3:22 | 6:21 | |
| 20 | Simon Imark | 39:03 | +3:47 | 6:25 |
Women
| 1 | Tove Alexandersson | 34:35 | 6:54 | ||
| 2 | Simona Aebersold | 35:02 | +0:27 | 6:59 | |
| 3 | Cecile Calandry | 36:02 | +1:27 | 7:11 | |
| 4 | Amy Nymalm | 36:23 | +1:48 | 7:15 | |
| 5 | Andrine Benjaminsen | 37:16 | +2:41 | 7:26 | |
| 6 | Lotta Karhola | 37:48 | +3:13 | 7:32 | |
| 7 | Ingrid Lundanes | 38:14 | +3:39 | 7:37 | |
| 8 | Inka Nurminen | 38:19 | +3:44 | 7:38 | |
| 9 | Line Cederberg | 38:38 | +4:03 | 7:42 | |
| 10 | Sanna Fast | 38:48 | +4:13 | 7:44 | |
| 11 | Denisa Kralova | 39:45 | +5:10 | 7:56 | |
| 12 | Sara Hagstrom | 39:59 | +5:24 | 7:58 | |
| 13 | Frida Vikstrom | 40:05 | +5:30 | 8:00 | |
| 14 | Malin Agervig Kristiansson | 40:10 | +5:35 | 8:01 | |
| 15 | Andrea Svensson | 40:37 | +6:02 | 8:06 | |
| 16 | Natalia Gemperle | 40:51 | +6:16 | 8:09 | |
| 17 | Jana Peterova | 41:07 | +6:32 | 8:12 | |
| 18 | Tereza Rauturier | 41:10 | +6:35 | 8:13 | |
| 19 | Ane Dyrkorn | 41:16 | +6:41 | 8:14 | |
| 20 | Anu Tuomisto | 41:22 | +6:47 | 8:15 |
Fascinating to hear many interviews before the middle distance where the runners were pointing out the importance of never losing contact with the map, playing it safe and so on with the experience of this terrain they have already had…to then throw all that over board to control 8, in both classes.
Neither searching contact with the small marsh, the ridge and yellow opening to the west, nor searching contact with the creek and following features to the east. Instead many world class runners bought a lotto ticket on this leg running straight ahead, with zero features to adjust to. And then after 2/3 of the leg they started a ’missing people’ kind of search operation for the post, totally fumbling in the dark. I wonder how the terrain presented itself right there to make them do that…