2010 WUC Orienteering Update: Last Day of Competitions

Team Sweden wins the men’s relay

BORLANGE – For the second day in a row, orienteering friends gathered at Gustafs orienteering arena. The last competition of the World University Orienteering Championship, the relay, finished a week full of successful competitions.

The men’s competition was in the end a tough fight between three nations. Sweden, Czech Republic and France. At the last leg, the Czech team disappeared in the woods followed by Team Sweden, approximately 20 seconds behind. But when the orienteer appeared at the second last control, the defending world champions Sweden with Johan Aronsson had distanced himself from his competitors. And accompanied by his team mates Patrik Karlsson and Erik Rost he crossed the finish line as number one.

‘My only thought was to be first over the finish line. I just took every situation out in the forest as it appeared. I was a couple of seconds behind, and the Czech opened hard, but I felt strong and managed to pass him and get a gap and kept making it bigger. I feel really nice’, said Johan Aronsson.

The coach, Björn Ljunggren was more than happy with his athletes’ performance and said: ‘We had a long discussion about choosing the right team. All our runners are on a very high level. Aronsson showed great shape on the long distance and is a great finisher. We have had a great team work the whole week and have a lot of fun together.’

In the Women’s Relay, competition was also tight, particularly between three teams. The Swiss, Finnish and the Czech teams have had great successes during the week and were off course confident also in the relay. The winner from Tuesday’s long distance Sara Lüscher (SUI) was challenged by yesterday’s gold and silver medallists Radka Brozkova (CZE) and Sofia Hajaanen (FIN) on the last leg.

In the end Switzerland took a convincing victory, distancing the competitors with nearly three minutes. ‘I knew that I had maybe 20 seconds on the Czech girl and wanted to stay calm, locate myself on the map and do my own race. I started to feel good and never saw the Czech girl again in the forest. I was never really nervous and wanted to make a good finish, so when I looked behind my back at the second last control I knew that I could make it all the way in. It was a great feeling seeing my team mates at the finish line’, said Sara Lüscher.

‘We are off course quit happy with the gold medal. All three girls were really good at the last competitions so we had a good hope. The whole team, both the women and the men have been really strong’, said the Swiss Coach.

It has been a fantastic competition week with many different nations on the podium. Switzerland won the most medals: 4 gold, 1 silver and 2 bronze medals. Sweden was number two with: 2 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze medals. On the third place came Czech Republic with 1 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medal.

The officials raceThe day finished with a special race for the team leaders, media, and officials, anyone who wanted to try orienteering for a day. The spectators were cheering and everyone in the race finished.

It has been a perfect week for the World University Orienteering Championship. The weather has been nice, only a few hours of rain and the organisation has been flawless.

Contestants, team leaders, officials, organizations, institutions, federations, everyone involved plus the people around Borlänge, have seen one of the best orienteering championships ever. The future of university orienteering looks very bright.

(Source: Jonas Karlsson and Ted Hammerin, OC)

 The Swedish Relay Golden Boys

The Swiss Relay Golden Girls

RESULTS DAY 4

Relay