WOC 2024 Sprint Relay: Maps, Results and brief Analysis

Jan Kocbach July 15, 2024 Orienteering News 1 Comment

Switzerland won the World Orienteering Championships (WOC) Sprint Relay after a very strong performance by Simona Aebersold on the last leg where she outran Sweden’s Tove Alexandersson, who was later disqualified for skipping a control. Finland took the second place with Norway in third.

The two big favourites, Switzerland and Sweden, followed each other closely from start to finish – with only seconds between them throughout the course. After the second leg it looked like all the other teams where out of the gold medal battle, but a very strong leg by Finland’s Tuomas Heikkila brought Finland all the way up to Sweden and Switzerland. The 3rd leg runners of Great Britain and Norway – Ralph Street and Kasper Fosser – also ran very strong races, bringing them within 25 seconds of leading Switzerland. Finland’s anchor woman Venla Harju kept Finland in the gold battle for half of the course, but was still very happy to take Finland to a medal.

Although Switzerland has been battling for the victory in every sprint relay the last years, this is actually the first WOC gold in the sprint relay for Switzerland since 2014, and the first time since 2016 that Sweden has not won.

Maps, GPS-tracking and results are available below.

Analysis

No detailed analysis is presented of the WOC 2024 sprint relay due to the low quality of the GPS-tracking combined with split times not being offered leg-by-leg or for all common controls (only variants across legs is offered), making it challenging to do a full analysis. Split time illustrations for each forking variant across legs (the split times provided by the organizers) are plotted in the results section. Some observations based on these illustrations:

Switzerland’s last leg runner Simona Aebersold actually lost 20 seconds to the best split on the routechoice leg to the second control, probably due to poorer route choice. She also lost 5 seconds to the best split on the long leg to control 7. Still she had the fastest leg time, showing her excellent physical shape and high running speed.
Czech Republic’s last leg runner Teresa Janosikova and France’s last leg runner Cecile Calandry lost around 25 seconds to the best split on the routechoice leg to the second control – this is were they lost contact with bronze medalist Norway.
Finland’s 3rd leg runner Tuomas Heikkila lost nearly 20 seconds to the best split time to the second control – but ran exceptionally fast the rest of the course.

All of these had the shortest variant for the second leg (see map below). It may look like the women lost time due to taking slower variants to the right, while Heikkila took the faster route to the left, but lost time the first part of the leg.

Finland’s last leg runner Venla Harju lost nearly 15 seconds to the best split on the routechoice leg to control 7 – this seems to be an execution mistake rather than a routechoice mistake. Several runners lost some time (mostly less than 10 seconds) by running left on this leg, though.
Norway’s 2nd leg runner Eirik Langedal Breivik lost nearly 30 seconds on the routechoiceleg to control 10 – this is were Norway lost contact with the gold medal battle. This also looks like an execution error – first skipping control 10 and then having to go back and get it.
Great Britain’s last leg runner Megan Carter Davies lost 35 seconds to the best split on the short forking leg to control 12 (the control that Alexandersson skipped), and another 20 seconds to control 13, losing contact with the medal battle here. Both mistakes look like some strange execution mistakes.
France’s 2nd leg runner Adrien Delenne lost more than 20 seconds on the short leg to the 18th control, taking a strange routechoice – this looks like misreading the map.

Maps and GPS-tracking

See the maps for the men’s and the women’s legs below. GPS-tracking is available here:

Results

Plac	Name	Leg time	Leg place	Time	Tot place	Diff
1	Switzerland 1			58:43.30
	1. Natalia Gemperle	14:50.59	4	14:50.59	4
	2. Riccardo Rancan	14:37.09	2	29:27.80	2	-2
	3. Joey Hadorn	14:37.59	6	44:05.40	1	-1
	4. Simona Aebersold	14:37.80	1	58:43.30	1	0
2	Finland 1			59:22.10
	1. Maija Sianoja	15:04.20	8	15:04.20	8
	2. Miika Kirmula	14:43.00	4	29:47.30	4	-4
	3. Tuomas Heikkila	14:21.09	2	44:08.40	3	-1
	4. Venla Harju	15:13.59	3	59:22.10	2	-1
3	Norway 1			59:46.60
	1. Victoria Haestad Bjornstad	14:59.40	6	14:59.40	6
	2. Eirik Langedal Breivik	15:18.50	14	30:18.00	8	+2
	3. Kasper Harlem Fosser	14:11.09	1	44:29.20	5	-3
	4. Andrine Benjaminsen	15:17.30	4	59:46.60	3	-2
4	Czechia 1			1:00:10.50
	1. Barbora Matejkova	15:30.00	12	15:30.00	12
	2. Jakub Glonek	14:48.90	6	30:19.00	10	-2
	3. Tomas Krivda	14:27.80	3	44:46.80	6	-4
	4. Tereza Janosikova	15:23.70	6	1:00:10.50	4	-2
5	France 1			1:00:11.60
	1. Isia Basset	15:34.40	16	15:34.40	16
	2. Adrien Delenne	14:43.70	5	30:18.10	9	-7
	3. Loic Capbern	14:31.40	4	44:49.50	7	-2
	4. Cecile Calandry	15:22.00	5	1:00:11.60	5	-2
6	Hungary 1			1:00:13.60
	1. Viktoria Mag	15:04.09	7	15:04.09	7
	2. Zoltan Bujdoso	15:08.80	12	30:13.00	6	-1
	3. Ferenc Jonas	14:57.90	11	45:11.00	8	+2
	4. Rita Maramarosi	15:02.50	2	1:00:13.60	6	-2
7	Great Britain 1			1:00:16.50
	1. Grace Molloy	14:48.50	2	14:48.50	2
	2. Freddie Carcas	15:01.00	10	29:49.50	5	+3
	3. Ralph Street	14:32.09	5	44:21.70	4	-1
	4. Megan Carter Davies	15:54.80	9	1:00:16.50	7	+3
8	Austria 1			1:01:26.70
	1. Anna Groell	15:30.59	13	15:30.59	13
	2. Jannis Bonek	14:56.20	9	30:26.80	11	-2
	3. Matthias Reiner	14:45.20	8	45:12.10	9	-2
	4. Ylvi Kastner	16:14.50	12	1:01:26.70	8	-1
9	Spain 1			1:01:51.60
	1. Nerea Gonzalez	15:13.70	9	15:13.70	9
	2. Pablo Ferrando	15:24.09	16	30:37.80	13	+4
	3. Alvaro Casado	15:24.40	14	46:02.30	11	-2
	4. Ana Isabel Toledo	15:49.30	8	1:01:51.60	9	-2
10	New Zealand 1			1:02:21.00
	1. Laura Robertson	16:02.70	22	16:02.70	22
	2. Joseph Lynch	15:16.30	13	31:19.00	15	-7
	3. Tim Robertson	14:57.30	10	46:16.40	15	0
	4. Lizzie Ingham	16:04.59	10	1:02:21.00	10	-5
11	Belgium 1			1:02:48.80
	1. Tille De Smul	15:47.40	18	15:47.40	18
	2. Yannick Michiels	14:25.90	1	30:13.40	7	-11
	3. Warre De Cuyper	15:07.50	12	45:20.90	10	+3
	4. Marine Sillien	17:27.89	18	1:02:48.80	11	+1
12	Ukraine 1			1:02:52.10
	1. Olena Babych	15:31.20	14	15:31.20	14
	2. Illia Otreshko	15:50.50	18	31:21.69	16	+2
	3. Ruslan Glibov	14:51.70	9	46:13.50	14	-2
	4. Olena Pitirimova	16:38.50	14	1:02:52.10	12	-2
13	Germany 1			1:03:09.70
	1. Hanna Mueller	15:34.30	15	15:34.30	15
	2. Felix Spaeth	15:07.40	11	30:41.69	14	-1
	3. Anselm Reichenbach	15:37.40	16	46:19.10	16	+2
	4. Birte Friedrichs	16:50.50	16	1:03:09.70	13	-3
14	Italy 1			1:03:14.80
	1. Caterina Dallera	15:36.40	17	15:36.40	17
	2. Francesco Mariani	14:56.00	8	30:32.40	12	-5
	3. Mattia Debertolis	15:36.20	15	46:08.70	12	0
	4. Maddalena De Biasi	17:06.09	17	1:03:14.80	14	+2
15	Australia 1			1:03:58.80
	1. Nea Shingler	16:26.40	27	16:26.40	27
	2. Brodie Nankervis	15:22.80	15	31:49.30	18	-9
	3. Henry McNulty	15:21.20	13	47:10.50	17	-1
	4. Caitlin Young	16:48.30	15	1:03:58.80	15	-2

Full results

Split time illustrations

See below for split time illustrations for each of the variants for selected runners/teams. From these illustrations one can see where runners lost times.