World of O News
Matthias Kyburz (Switzerland) and Tove Alexandersson (Sweden) won the the European Championships (EOC) KO-Sprint in Vicenza, Italy – the last race in this year’s EOC and also in the 2023 World Cup . Both Kyburz and Alexandersson also won the overall World Cup with their good races this last World Cup round.
Matthias Kyburz and Tove Alexandersson seemed to have higher speed than the others today, that being a decisive factor. In the men’s class, Jonatan Gustaffson and Emil Svensk (both Sweden) finished 2nd and 3rd. In the women’s class the other medals went to Elena Roos and Natalia Gemperle (both Switzerland).
With both the semi-finals and final unforked, the races were a lot about fast running – but with mistakes and non-optimal routechoices playing a role in some of the heats. The quarter-finals used “Runners Choice” forking, with more challenging orienteering according to the men’s winner Matthias Kyburz.
Kasper Fosser (Norway), who was in the lead in the overall World Cup ahead of the final race, was unfortunate and crashed heavily with another competitor, Joey Hadorn (Switzerland), around a corner towards the end of the racewhen on the way to a top result in one of the quarterfinal. Both had to abandon their races and travel to the hospital for checks – according to the IOF there are no serious injuries. After the race there was some critics from the women’s winner, Tove Alexandersson, about the runners’ safety – giving this crash as one example – and also the dangers involved when running in a city center with many people everywhere (who are not aware that there is a race going on).
Maps and GPS-tracking
EOC 2023, Knock out sprint, Men final
» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
EOC 2023, Knock out sprint, Women final
» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
EOC 2023, Knock out sprint, Men semifinals
» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
EOC 2023, Knock out sprint, Women semifinals
» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
EOC 2023, Knock out sprint, Men Quarter finals
» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
EOC 2023, Knock out sprint, Women Quarter finals
» See map in omaps.worldofo.com
Results
Men
Women
The concept of Knock Out sprint really came home to roost yesterday when Fosser and Hadorn literally knocked each other out. Also with the effect that Fosser lost the fight for the overall World Cup in that moment.
This fairly new variant of sprint orienteering certainly has it’s built in problems.
• The overuse of the same blocks / areas through several stages of the competition.
• The shoving and pushing around some controls in and outs.
• The risk of collisions at high speed around sharp corners in different directions.
The day a competitor knocks out an ordinary citizen instead of another competitor, Knock Out sprint will be in big trouble. Is this really going to take place in crowded city centers during busy shopping hours?
Visibility of orienteering is one of the key long-term goals. City sprint is for visibility and presense on TV. In this case TV missed the most potentially observable/clickable/discussed episode, thus failed to make orienteering visible. So what, back to forest?
Hello
First off all congrats for your work, it’s very nice to read so much interresting articles.
I would like to know where to find the WOC 2011 long final Menheadcam video because it isn’t possible to load it with the following link: http://3drerun.worldofo.com/?saved=1&id=-28892;0&videoname=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4xNmdT9vtk&videooffset=-3
Thanks a lot
Hervé