Home / Orienteering News / WOC 2025 Long: Maps, Results and Analysis

WOC 2025 Long: Maps, Results and Analysis

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[Including comparisons for all legs] Reigning World Champions Simona Aebersold (Switzerland) and Kasper Fosser (Norway) both defended their titles from Switzerland in 2023 over the long distance at the 2025 World Orienteering Championships (WOC) in Kuopio, Finland. For Aebersold the margin was only 9 seconds after a thriller finish – while Fosser’s margin increased meter by meter up to nearly 3 minutes in the end.

In  the women’s class Aebersold had a very tight battle with Wednesday’s Middle distance winner Tove Alexandersson (Sweden) towards the end of the race, with Alexandersson making a 2 minute mistake at the 21st control followed by another 30 second mistake at the 22nd control that cost here the gold medal – which it looked like she already had in her pocket. The gap down to Andrine Benjaminsen (Norway) in third was more than two minutes, with Natalia Gemperle (Switzerland), Sanna Fast (Sweden) and Venla Harju (Finland) finishing in the next places.

For Fosser this was the third WOC Long gold medal in a row – coming just at the back of Norways’ Olav Lundanes’ dominant period where he took four WOC Long gold medals in a row. Fosser went clear of the competition early – the biggest challenge seemed to come from Wednesday’s Middle distance winner Eirik Langedal Breivik who took a 20 second lead on the first TV control. Breivik had, however, started much too fast, and was empty after only 40 minutes of running and abandoned the race early. In the end Martin Regborn (Sweden) was closest to Fosser at 2:57, with Matthias Kyburz (Switzerland) taking bronze at 3:40. The Svensk brothers Emil and Viktor (both Sweden) finished 4th and 5th, with Finland’s Miika Kirmula in 6th.

Analysis Women: Tight finish after mistakes towards the end

See below for a graphical representation of the battle for the victory between Aebersold (red) and Alexandersson (green). Here the runners lose time to the best split time when the curve goes downwards, and have the fastest split time when it is flat.

plot - 2025-07-11T005626.214

As you can see, Aebersold has a very strong start, running best split times on nearly all legs until the 5th control – but then she gets a big mistake on the first TV-control, the 6th control (all legs with routes of top runners are shown at the bottom of the article, only selected legs are shown here).

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Alexandersson on the other hand has a worse start, doing small mistakes and not choosing the fastest route choice on the leg to the second control – see the 6th leg below.

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Aebersold continues to struggle and lose some time to control 8 and 9.

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But on the next long leg to control 12 Aebersold runs the best route choice to the left, while Alexandersson runs straight and loses nearly a minute.

leg_12_b

Both lose time to control 14 – but Alexandersson more.

leg_14_b

Then Alexandersson wins 4 legs while Aebersold makes small mistakes – at this point in the course Alexandersson has a lead of 1:43 with only a few controls left to run, and everything points towards a second gold medal for the Swede.

However, at the 19th leg they both struggle, but Alexandersson more with a 2 minute mistake while Aebersold only loses half a minute due to uncertainty into the control.

leg_19_b

With another mistake at control 20, this seals the day for Alexandersson – now the Swede is 19 seconds behind, and even with a strong finish it is not enough to beat Aebersold (the red route to the right below is Alexandersson’s route)

leg_20_b

For a look at the battle for the bronze medal, see the graphical split time representation below. You can clearly see that the other runners have not got the speed of the two first women on most of the course – but Benjaminsen has a very strong period from control  12 to control 19 where she matches the speed of the top women and runs two fastest legs and several legs where she is very close to the fastest split time (and not due to running with Aebersold or Alexandersson – luckily the top contenters spent most of the race on their own this time). Even with a mistake at the first control and some losses towards the end, this is enough to secure her the bronze medal.

plot - 2025-07-11T005646.407

Analysis Men: One man above all others

See below for a graphical representation of the battle for the medals in the men’s class. Here again the runners lose time to the best split time when the curve goes downwards, and have the fastest split time when it is flat.

plot - 2025-07-11T005812.800

As you can see, Fosser has a very strong period until the 12 control where he steadily builds up the lead to his competitors to 1:42. Then he loses 42 seconds to Matthias Kyburz on the leg to control 13 on a slower route choice (straight instead of around on the path). From here on Fosser does very few mistakes, and builds out his lead to 2:57 in the end, running best split time or very close to the best split time all the way. In the battle for the other medals, the long leg to control 11 proved very decisive: Here Emil Svensk ran the slower route to the right and lost the silver medal. Kyburz’s did several small mistakes, including to the 5th control and the routes to the 16th and 18th control, but it was still enough to secure the bronze medal.

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leg_11_d

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leg_18_b

 

plot - 2025-07-11T005740.012

GPS-tracking

WOC Long distance Women (11.05)

» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
WOC Long distance Men (12.38)

» See map in omaps.worldofo.com

Routechoices for all legs: Women

leg_01_a leg_01_b leg_01_c leg_02_a leg_02_b leg_02_c leg_02_d leg_03_a leg_03_b leg_04_a leg_04_b leg_05_a leg_05_b leg_05_c leg_05_d leg_06_a leg_06_b leg_07_a leg_07_b leg_08_a leg_08_b leg_08_c leg_09_a leg_09_b leg_09_c leg_09_d leg_10_a leg_10_b leg_11_a leg_11_b leg_12_a leg_12_b leg_12_c leg_12_d leg_13_a leg_13_b leg_14_a leg_14_b leg_15_a leg_15_b leg_16_a leg_16_b leg_17_a leg_17_b leg_18_a leg_18_b leg_19_a leg_19_b leg_20_a leg_20_b leg_21_a leg_21_b leg_22_a leg_22_b leg_23_a leg_23_b

Routechoices for all legs: Men

leg_01_a leg_01_b leg_02_a leg_02_b leg_02_c leg_02_d leg_03_a leg_03_b leg_03_c leg_03_d leg_04_a leg_04_b leg_05_a leg_05_b leg_06_a leg_06_b leg_07_a leg_07_b leg_08_a leg_08_b leg_08_c leg_08_d leg_09_a leg_09_b leg_10_a leg_10_b leg_11_a leg_11_b leg_11_c leg_11_d leg_12_a leg_12_b leg_13_a leg_13_b leg_13_c leg_13_d leg_14_a leg_14_b leg_15_a leg_15_b leg_16_a leg_16_b leg_17_a leg_17_b leg_17_c leg_17_d leg_18_a leg_18_b leg_18_c leg_18_d leg_19_a leg_19_b leg_20_a leg_20_b leg_21_a leg_21_b leg_22_a leg_22_b leg_23_a leg_23_b leg_24_a leg_24_b leg_25_a leg_25_b leg_26_a leg_26_b leg_27_a leg_27_b

Maps

wocwomen2025long wocmen2025long

Results

Women

1 Simona Aebersold SUI 1:34:51 7:07
2 Tove Alexandersson SWE 1:35:00 +0:09 7:08
3 Andrine Benjaminsen NOR 1:37:16 +2:25 7:18
4 Natalia Gemperle SUI 1:38:22 +3:31 7:23
5 Sanna Fast SWE 1:39:11 +4:20 7:27
6 Venla Harju FIN 1:41:27 +6:36 7:37
7 Sara Hagstrom SWE 1:44:21 +9:30 7:50
8 Ida Haapala FIN 1:45:21 +10:30 7:55
9 Hanna Lundberg SWE 1:46:24 +11:33 8:00
10 Marie Olaussen NOR 1:48:17 +13:26 8:08
11 Aleksandra Hornik POL 1:49:19 +14:28 8:13
12 Kamilla Steiwer NOR 1:49:35 +14:44 8:14
13 Malin Agervig Kristiansson DEN 1:49:59 +15:08 8:16
14 Grace Molloy GBR 1:50:12 +15:21 8:17
15 Evely Kaasiku EST 1:50:40 +15:49 8:19
16 Tereza Rauturier CZE 1:51:56 +17:05 8:24
17 Sanna Hotz SUI 1:52:57 +18:06 8:29
18 Denisa Kralova CZE 1:54:18 +19:27 8:35
19 Eef van Dongen NED 1:55:19 +20:28 8:40
20 Viktoria Mag HUN 1:57:25 +22:34 8:49

Men

1 Kasper Harlem Fosser NOR 1:37:50 6:06
2 Martin Regborn SWE 1:40:47 +2:57 6:17
3 Matthias Kyburz SUI 1:41:30 +3:40 6:20
4 Emil Svensk SWE 1:41:41 +3:51 6:21
5 Viktor Svensk SWE 1:43:10 +5:20 6:26
6 Miika Kirmula FIN 1:43:33 +5:43 6:28
7 Martin Hubmann SUI 1:44:44 +6:54 6:32
8 Lukas Liland NOR 1:44:51 +7:01 6:33
9 Akseli Ruohola FIN 1:46:00 +8:10 6:37
10 Jannis Bonek AUT 1:49:48 +11:58 6:51
11 Jonas Egger SUI 1:50:42 +12:52 6:55
12 Quentin Moulet FRA 1:50:45 +12:55 6:55
13 Jurgen Joonas EST 1:51:01 +13:11 6:56
14 Isak Jonsson NOR 1:51:32 +13:42 6:58
15 Linus Agervig Kristiansson DEN 1:53:43 +15:53 7:06
16 Vegard Jarvis Westergard CAN 1:56:43 +18:53 7:17
17 Timo Sild EST 1:57:06 +19:16 7:19
18 Boyan Ivandjikov BUL 1:58:00 +20:10 7:22
19 Mathias Blaise BEL 1:59:12 +21:22 7:27
20 Eetu Savolainen FIN 1:59:37 +21:47 7:28

All results

About Jan Kocbach

Jan Kocbach is the founder of WorldofO.com - taking care of everything from site development to writing articles, photography and analysis.

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4 comments

  1. Terje Wiig Mathisen

    Thank You Jan!
    Another wonderful WOC analysis article (how can you make them so quickly?), this time showing clearly that this year the gold medals were determined by who made the least mistakes, both on the controls and on the amazing long legs. Even with a theoretical perfectly executed race, you would still need to be in the top 6 or so women in running speed, while even fewer men could have challenged Kasper.

    I hereby suggest these courses for Course of the Year! :-)

  2. is it really possible that the IOF rules allow now to seperate the top runners on the start list? after ages of flock running in the most long distance runs?
    wow! but what is the new alorythm…?

  3. Great analysis, Jan, and I agree with Terje, not only a worthy Course of the Year nominee, but also a very good planned course for TV broadcast, with excitement all the way. To compare, the middle was a bit disappointing in that matter as the first TV Control came after the trickiest section of the course. But this one was really great!
    Arild/commentator NRK

  4. Do you know why this years program is so tight, why isn’t there a rest day between the middle and the long?
    Thanks for excellent analysis!

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