Capri, the World Champs 2023 Mascot, on stage at the World Champs 2022
World Champs 2024 Selection (Test) Races, 3rd, 4th, 6th June.
Flims Laax, best known as a ski resort, hosts the Orienteering World Champs in July. The Champs are being held in conjunction with the Swiss-O Week.
Switzerland has a well-earned reputation for organising orienteering. This encompasses major international competitions of the sort we report, but also mass participation festivals. This year the 6-day Swiss-O week starts the same day as the WOC Relay on July 16th and runs to the 22nd. It has already hit the day 3 capacity of 4000 runners: the capacity of the Mountain Railway!
Needless to say Switzerland is one of the big four in winning World Champs medals, and its top runners are amongst the best-known names in the sport. The country invariably hosts a major international competition round every year. Many years, as it was in 2022, that is the World Cup Final. This year it's the World Champs. They are July 12th - 16th and are forest middle, long and relay races.
Great Britain (GBR) as all countries can enter one relay team and three runners in the middle races for both women and men. In the long, where quotas are set based on recent previous World Championships results compared to other countries, GBR can enter three women and two men.
Capri is an ibex, in case you were wondering.
Location
The races are in Eastern Switzerland, 75 miles south of Zurich and a little to the west of Chur.
Terrain
The terrain for WOC and the test races is described as "pre-alpine".
<< WOC 2023 in Flims Laax and the Swiss Orienteering Week will take place in one of the most beautiful areas in the mountain canton of Graubünden. It is the impressive mountain formations that border the competition area in the north, the Rhine Gorge, which wildly and inaccessibly limits the competition maps in the south, and the unique flora and fauna in the forests and on the lakes in and around the area in which the competitions will take place, that provide the unique setting for these events. >>
part of the LaMutta-UaulGrond training map
<< The terrain (for Middle & Relay) is affected by the largest landslide ever seen in the Alps. Pre-alpine terrain with countless contour details, forms and rock formations at 800-1500 m above sea level. Most slopes are moderate, some are steep and certainly with breathtaking views. The detailed, complex contours and the countless rock details require accurate map reading. Magical moments are certain when navigating around hills, depressions or boulders and seeing the control exactly where you expect it to be. >>
The GB Team for the World Champs will be selected after the Test Races being put on by the WOC Competition. There are middle test races next weekend 3rd and 4th June, and long test races on Tuesday 6th. There are over 300 entries from 27 countries. So that each field is not too big there will be parallel courses each day: a country's runners are all placed on the same course.
Training maps are available for many areas in the leadup to the test races, and there is centrally organised training in the three days before the first test race. The selection document notes there is a GB Development/Performance squad camp encompassing the test races.
GBR entries for Test Races
Full entry list for the Swiss Test Races There are 45 entries from Finland, more even than from Switzerland.
GBR women entered are: Alison O'Neill, Cecilie Andersen, Fiona Bunn, Grace Molloy, Laura King, Jo Shepherd and Megan Carter-Davies.
GBR men entered are: Alastair Thomas, Ben Mitchell, Chris Smithard, Joe Woodley, Joshua Dudley, Nathan Lawson, Peter Taylor-Bray, Ralph Street and Will Gardner. Peter is entered on the long only, Ralph on the middle races only.
Courses
Middle
1:10000, Approx. WOMEN 4.7km/240m, MEN 5.6km/280m
Long
1:15000, Approx: WOMEN 9.7km/660m, MEN 12.2km/840m
Other News
Race The Abbeys
The WRE races in Kelso and Jedburgh on 10th and 11th June are GBR selection races for the sprint disciplines, notably the second round of this year's World Cup, in Czechia, in early August. The entry lists are on Sientries.
Web TV World Cup Round 1
The IOF TV Broadcasts of last month's World Cup Round 1 Races are available for no charge at the IOF TV website (registration required.) The drone and running camera footage is great.
TioMila
There are lots of races for the top runners at this time of year. It was TiomIla in Sweden last weekend, being held further north than ever before so even more travel for most athletes. The women's relay of five legs (for the last time, next year it is seven), and the men's relay of 10 legs were on Web TV. Half the GBR athletes entered for the WOC test races made the journey to Skellefteå.
In the women's relay (damkavlen) JK winners Nydalens SK came third behind two IFK Göteborg teams. Fiona and Laura (16th fastest on her leg) ran the first two legs for Södertälje-Nykvarn, who finished 13th. Cecilie Andersen ran leg 1 for IFK Lidingö, who were 35th and Megan Carter-Davies ran leg 1 for Rajamäen Rykmentti, coming in 14th on the leg, with the team finishing 66th. Highest placed GBR runner was Jo Shepherd running the long middle leg for Halden who were 9th.
In the open race it was close for the claim to be highest placed Brit. Ralph Street (leg 4 - the long night) and Matt Speake (leg 5) got the claim with Bækkelagets SK 17th place. They were just ahead of the winning club's second team NTNUI 2, who were 19th with Alastair Thomas running leg 8, and Nydalens SK who were 20th, with Alan Cherry running leg 1. Hector Haines and Harry McMurtrie ran legs 2 and 3 respectively for IFK Lidingö who were 32nd. Ben Mitchell was 18th on leg 1 for Rajamäen Rykmentti, the team finishing 77th. Joshua Dudley ran leg 4 for IFK Göteborg 2, starting and finishing in 34th position, but the team did not record a final result.
IFK Göteborg 4 was an all women team running the open relay, all of whom had run in the damkavlen earlier. They were 102nd.
An episode of the Ivarnational Podcast (available in lots of places) summarises what went on, and also with the massive World Ranking Event Swedish League race the Thursday before.
Jukola
Jukola is 17th and 18th June, a short distance east of Helsinki. Expect several of the GBR runners to be in Finland running with their Scandinavian clubs.