Fast Forward for South America - International Orienteering Federation

Transcription

I N T E R N AT I O N A L O R I E N T E E R I N G F E D E R AT I O N
2014
Fast
Forward for
South America
Turkish participant at the Ski Orienteering Development Clinic and World Ranking Event in Turkey 2014.
2
ORIENTEERING WORLD•2014
2014
Contents
6
BUILDING THE FRAMEWORK FOR NEW GROWTH
8
MAN WITH A MISSION – JOSÉ ANGEL NIETO POBLETE
13
18
20
24
27
SPREADING MTB ORIENTEERING ACROSS THE WORLD
18 YEARS OF SERVICE TO INTERNATIONAL
ORIENTEERING
FOOT ORIENTEERING: A YEAR TO REMEMBER FOR
JUDITH WYDER
SKI ORIENTEERING: A BIG STEP FORWARD AS A TV
SPORT
TRAIL ORIENTEERING: MICHAEL JOHANSSON AND
MARTIN JULLUM
30
MTB ORIENTEERING: A LOT TO CELEBRATE!
34
NEWS IN BRIEF
36
IOF MEMBERS
38
MAJOR EVENTS
3
2014
Contacts
Published by:
International Orienteering Federation (IOF)
Radiokatu 20
00093 VALO
FINLAND
www.orienteering.org
Twitter: @IOFOrienteering
Editor-in-chief:
Anna Jacobson, Assistant Secretary General, IOF
Email: [email protected]
Editor:
Clive Allen
Contributors to this edition:
Erik Borg, Joaquim Margarido
Visual design:
Mainos Mariini
Layout:
Suunnistaja Magazine
email: [email protected]
Printer:
Eura Print Oy
PL 5, Antinkuja 1, 27511 Eura
FINLAND
Publication notes
ORIENTEERING WORLD is the official journal of the
International Orienteering Federation (IOF). Permission from the editor-in-chief should be sought prior to
reproduction of articles or photographs.
ISSN 1015-4965
Next issue: November 2015
Front cover: Mixed Relay Start at The World Games
2013, Photo: Anna Jacobson
President’s Foreword
That was 2014...
As I write this article, 2014 is drawing to a
close and I am looking back on an exciting and challenging orienteering year. It
has been a year when our TV products in
both Ski and Foot orienteering reached
new levels of quality and distribution at
the European Ski Orienteering Championships in Tyumen Russia and at the World
Orienteering Championships in Venice and
Trentino in Italy. It has been a year when
the orienteering family grew to 78 member countries and we expect to be over 80
countries before too long into 2015. It was
a year when, for the first time ever in South
America, we staged a major IOF event, the
World Masters Orienteering Championships,
in Brazil.
In Italy in particular at the World Orienteering Championships we showed we can
bring our sport to fantastic iconic venues
like the historic city of Venice and create
a major sporting spectacle and challenging competition. In staging our first mixed
sprint relay championships in the city of
Trento, we became one of the few sports in
the world to have men and women competing together in the same teams.
All of these developments and activities
provide us with an outstanding showcase
and increasingly strong credentials to be
considered for a future Olympic Games. The
International Olympic Committee has been
taking time under new President Thomas
Bach to evaluate its future direction in its
Agenda 2020 project. The recommendations from that work are being considered
by the IOC at its session in Monaco in
December 2014 and they are likely to bring
far reaching changes to the whole Olympic
movement. Orienteering stands ready to
argue its case for inclusion in the Games
when that opportunity arises and we can do
so with even greater confidence following
the direction of travel identified in Agenda
2020. We are a global sport with a special
appeal to young people which makes outstanding use of new technology like satellite tracking and innovative TV production.
We are a sport which uses natural terrain in
open country and cities and consequently
does not require the building of expensive
stadia or other facilities. Especially in terms
of the Winter Games, we can share facilities
like ski stadia with other sports like biathlon
and cross country skiing and in terms of
numbers, we can bring entries from countries the equal of any other winter sport.
Our focus on becoming a global sport has
been strengthened greatly by our Regional
Development work and this is the theme of
this edition of Orienteering World. To take
our development work further and to build
on the excellent work being done in many
countries, we are setting up a new Youth
and Regional Development Commission
which will start its work in 2015.
At the end of the year we have a different
type of challenge because we are saying
farewell at the end of 2014 to two outstanding servants of the IOF. Barbro Rönnberg
retires from the post at the end of the
year after 18 years of commitment as our
Secretary General and we all owe Barbro a
huge debt of gratitude for her professional
leadership of the administration of the IOF
over a period of incredible change and
development. She will be greatly missed by
all of us. Björn Persson, our Sports Director
for the past 8 years is moving on to focus
his energy on his other business activities.
Björn too has made a unique contribution
to the sport especially in making us a TV
and spectator friendly sport and his service
goes well beyond the period when he was a
professional member of the team including
a total of 22 years work for the IOF. Björn
and Barbro go with our best wishes and
warmest thanks.
Brian Porteous
IOF President
And finally, as we look forward into 2015,
Tom Hollowell, our new Secretary General
and Chief Executive Officer will be joining us
and taking over the compass from Barbro.
We wish Tom every success as he too faces
up to the exciting challenges which the
sport of orienteering always produces.
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n
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Regional Development:
Building the framework
for new growth
‘Regional Development’ – a simple phrase embracing many initiatives, all with similar objectives:
raising the profile of orienteering
as a whole, attracting more participants to the sport, and encouraging growth in all the sport’s disciplines – foot, ski, mountain bike
and trail orienteering.
And these initiatives take many forms
– from high-profile TV production and
celebrity participation, through taking part
in more international Games along with
other sports, to grass-roots developments
of various kinds world-wide. This edition
of Orienteering World features in detail
two of the bigger growth areas – mountain bike orienteering, currently gaining
momentum in many new countries, and
South America, which has recently been
host to its first-ever major international
orienteering event, the World Masters
Championships held in Brazil which attracted almost 3,000 competitors from all
over the world.
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Here below are some of the bigger development stories that have caught the eye this year.
Big strides forward in
TV production quality
More and better TV coverage continues
to be a key feature in raising the profile of
orienteering. In 2014, Ski Orienteering (European Championships) and Foot Orienteering (World Championships) benefited
from superb TV productions made widely
available. New technology and production
techniques are now revolutionising orienteering for the armchair viewer.
And the potential is huge – as Emily Benham, World Cup winner in MTB orienteering,
explains: “Cycling is really big at the moment,
so there must be a significant portion of the
population that would have an interest in
watching a cycling-based sport on TV. It’s the
same in Scandinavia with skiing and ski orienteering. In addition, disability and precision
sports are really growing since London 2012,
and it’s a real opportunity for TempO and
PreO to promote themselves to an increasingly interested public. There are so many me-
Royals race into the finish.
dia opportunities surrounding orienteering,
but it needs a good plan and a bit of financial
backing to get started.”
For Emily, “the Tour de France is boring in
comparison to watching that little GPS dot in
real time go off-track, and trying to shout it
back to the right route choice!”
Royals find their way
in the forest
Crown Prince Frederik, heir to the Danish
throne, took part for the third year in succession in the annual National Orienteering Day organised in April by the Danish
Orienteering Federation. This year he
and three of his family – his wife Princess Mary and their two oldest children
Prince Christian (8 years old) and Princess
Isabella (6) – completed a course with 14
controls in about 20 minutes.
Prince Christian was really enthusiastic and
completed the course with a fine sprint to the
finish, the others coming in at a good pace
behind him. “That was fun!”, he said. Prince
Christian and his sister had been to a similar
event last year with their father, and this year
was the first time Princess Mary had also been
present. After the run she said how impressed
she was by the event and how good it was
to see whole families enjoying the course together. “It’s a very good way of getting some
exercise – to focus on something else than
just thinking about the running”, she said.
Danish orienteering gained extensive media
coverage of the occasion – far more than from
its successes at the World Championships! A
total of 2,858 people attended 43 introductory events put on by the Danish clubs on
National Orienteering Day, all free of charge.
New opportunities in
Multi-Sport Games –
Ski Orienteering
The International University Sports Federation (FISU) has awarded the Winter Universiade 2019 to Krasnoyarsk, Russia, and at the
same time has confirmed that ski orienteering will be one of the sports in Krasnoyarsk.
This news came at the same time as the news
about the first World University Ski Orienteering Championships, to be held in 2016 also in
Russia. Ski orienteering has in recent years become a new sport in the Asian Winter Games
and the CISM Military World Winter Games;
participation in the Winter Universiade is
another huge step forward for the discipline.
IOF Development
Clinics – now an
established tradition
Every year the IOF organises, in conjunction with the World Orienteering Championships (WOC), a Development Clinic for
emerging nations. We asked Blandine Astrade, coordinator for the clinics, for some
stories from the 2014 Clinic held in Italy.
“I have in mind the extremely long race of
one girl from South America during the Long
Distance. She got lost on the second-last
control. We finally found her, thanks to the
GPS tracking, on the opposite side of the
mountain, in the town where the quarantine
had been located, one hour’s walk from the
control point.”
“The following story allows me to emphasise
the enthusiasm of the participants during
this event, despite the difficulties and the
time spent running. I remember the question
of an athlete during the Sprint Qualification
when he asked me why, on his final split-time
sheet, one control line did not indicate the
time difference compared to the best time.
He believed he was disqualified, but finally he
was informed that he had actually done the
best time of all the runners! I will never forget
the pride I saw in his eyes at that moment.”
“The feedback the participants give me when
the clinic and WOC are ending is always
positive. They are very grateful for such an
Strong Regional
Growth in Europe
South-eastern Europe is an area that has
enjoyed strong growth in recent years,
thanks to the work of ‘SEEOWG’ – the
South-East European Orienteering Working Group – and ‘COMOF’, the Confederation of Meditteranean Orienteering
Federations.
A key person within these two organisations
is the Serbian Zoran Milanović, who has been
involved in this area of regional development
since he himself was an elite athlete competing
for Yugoslavia. SEEOWG organises a range of
activities each year. “The Balkan Orienteering
Championships used to be the big event of
the year in this region, but since 2011 these
has been replaced by the South East European
Orienteering Championships (SEEOCs): 2011
Macedonia, 2012 Turkey, 2013 Romania, 2014
Serbia, and for 2015 we had two bids, Croatia
and Bulgaria. These Championships are for
youth, junior, elite and masters classes,” he tells.
“Regularly each year we also have development seminars on different issues in different
countries. Earlier we have held IOF-supported
seminars in Montenegro, Turkey, Bosnia, Cyprus and Bulgaria, and more recently we have
had development seminars in Moldova (organising events, course planning and youth
coaching) and in Croatia (about trail O). We
find these very important, especially because
we are using experts from our region, which
means in the language of local participants,
who find this opportunity most helpful.”
New opportunities in
Multi-Sport Games –
Youth
When the United World Games take
place for the 11th time in June 2015 at
Lake Wörthersee, Klagenfurt in Austria,
orienteering will make its entrance as the
first-ever individual sport in the Games.
Thousands of young athletes from more than
30 countries participate in the United World
Games. The sports at the Games have included until 2014 soccer, handball, basketball,
volleyball, tennis, rugby and field hockey.
investment by the IOF in their respect. They
specially like to be involved in the orienteering ‘family’ during this big event, also to be
supported in the organisation of their participation. For some of them it is their first stay
in Europe, and everything is new: the terrain,
the crowd of runners they encounter in the
forest during the open races, the enthusiasm
and fervour of supporters for their national
champions, the size of the organisation for
such an event.”
Pablo Sanguinetti, Uruguay, at the World
Championships long distance start. Photo:
Zoran Milovanovic
“We have decided to try to get orienteering
included in the official programme of the
Mediterranean Games in 2017. As a first step
towards this aim, a promotional orienteering
event was organised during the Mediterranean Games in Mersin, Turkey to show our
sport to other athletes and officials from the
Mediterranean region.”
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Man with a mission
José Angel Nieto Poblete
By Joaquim Margarido
José Angel is a Spaniard who has
set his heart on introducing orienteering to every possible land
in South America. And with such
success! Read on …
“I found this wonderful sport 30 years ago,
running my first race in February 1984. Map
scale 1:25,000, wooden flags bearing the
punching system that was like a postmark,
ink spots everywhere at the finish; running in the classic garb of a former football
player – shorts and shirt – and normal shoes.
I never looked at that punching system as a
rudimentary one, quite otherwise – I saw it
as the latest technology in a new sport called
orienteering. And it was, indeed, something
completely new for me. From there on, everything I met for the first time was a new bit of
fun, and I enjoyed it all as a really nice novelty
in what was itself a very young sport.”
Common to many of those who took their
first steps in orienteering in those crazy 1980s,
José Angel Nieto Poblete fell in love with
orienteering at first sight. To introduce and
promote orienteering became a true ideal in
his life, and he has now carried its flag and
spread its fragrance in many countries where
this had been a virtually unknown sport.
We join him on his journey that links his native Spain to a wide range of countries in Latin
America, where he has been a tireless worker
in presenting and expanding our sport.
A dreamer at heart
Born 52 years ago in Ciudad Real in Spain,
José Angel Nieto Poblete has always been a
dreamer. At the age of 7 he dreamt of being
a football player. For Real Madrid, of course.
Later, at the age of 16, his feet on the ground,
he left football behind to join the Military
Academy, where he made his career. Ciudad
Real, a place he loves and where he still works,
awarded him in 2007 the title of Pandorgo,
the “city’s representative”.
He embraced orienteering as a “man of
causes” would – with enthusiasm and imagination. While he gathered information and
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learnt more about the sport, his desire grew
to introduce it in his city, in his province, in his
region. In due course he became a member
of the group of dreamers who worked to
make orienteering in Spain an unshakeable
reality. Since then, organisation and competition have been for José two faces of a single
coin. Based on strong early foundations, the
project of founding the Spanish Orienteering
Federation (FEDO) was carried forward with
unhindered purpose and with pride. José
himself played an integral part, occupying
from the very beginning positions of responsibility including the development of FEDO’s
Competitions section, and he was a member
too of FEDO’s Technical Commission.
Two platforms for the South America dream
José Angel participated along with another
prominent name in Spanish orienteering,
José Samper, in the 3rd edition of the Latin
Countries Cup in France in 1997. This first
contact with the event would prove to be decisive in the future, because he found within
it one of the platforms for his current projects.
Present at the races every year except in 2004,
Jose Angel was elected Secretary General of
the Latin Countries Cup in 2005 with the support of all countries; he still occupies the role.
Parallel to this, in 2010, FEDO’s President
Victor Garcia offered him the post of VicePresident of FEDO, with responsibility for
international relations. He accepted the post,
and this became the second platform from
which he started to develop a large number
of projects, not only in Latin America but also
in other countries around the world. Solid
roots were established – and José Angel
could anticipate a lot of hard work.
Latin Cup to Brazil and Uruguay
José Angel brought expansionist ideas to
his role as Secretary General of the Latin
Countries Cup competition, with the major
objective of having a more open competition
with more countries taking part. The Latin
Countries Cup is an international event in
which, according to its rules, all countries of
Latin origin may participate. However only
Brazil and a few other sporadic representa-
José Angel Nieto Poblete holding a seminar in
Dominican Republic.
tives from the other side of the Atlantic Ocean
had participated in a competition that had
always been organised in Europe. Within the
new design, José Angel wanted to involve the
Latin American countries properly, and this
meant organizing competitions on the other
side of the Atlantic.
Thus in Belgium in 2006 he got Brazil’s agreement to host the 15th edition of the Latin
Countries Cup, to be organised in Santa Cruz
do Sul. The event was held in 2009, organised
by José Otavio Dornelles, President of the
Brazilian Orienteering Confederation. The
results were positive and the future was clear:
it was time to give prominence to the Latin
American countries.
At the end of this event José Angel asked
Víctor Pérez, Vice-President of the Uruguayan
Orienteering Federation at the time, to take
responsibility for ensuring that the Cup would
return to South America. The challenge was
accepted, and Uruguay participated in the
following editions of the Latin Countries Cup
in order to gain experience and knowledge.
And Uruguay has been the proud host of the
Latin Countries Cup’s 20th edition, held this
November in Punta del Este and Piriápolis.
This event in Uruguay is a landmark in a
new era, in which the event is committed to
alternating between the two Continents. José
Angel’s crusade has borne fruit!
Completing the South
America map
It’s impossible to establish a standard
method for José Angel Nieto Poblete’s
approach to each country he has visited.
Every one of them has its idiosyncrasies,
different ways of seeing the sport, peculiarities. Orienteering has come to each of them
in several different ways: through schools,
by individuals, through a military route, the
Interview in Ecuadorian TV about orienteering.
Right: Clinic participants at the end of an orienteering clinic in Latacunga,
Ecuador.
University, the institutions...
From the sustained work in Uruguay to the
reunification of a divided Argentina, from
the hope called Costa Rica to the certainty of
orienteering in Chile, from Ecuador’s revitalization to the seed-sowing in Cuba, thousands
and thousands of kilometres have been
travelled, hundreds of courses and competitions held, and dozens of maps drawn. Seeds
are also sown in Paraguay, Bolivia, Guatemala,
Dominican Republic and Haiti, and José
Angel has a dream, one that still awaits its full
achievement: to plant an o-flag in some place
in every country in Latin America.
Contacts with other nations are being
maintained, and José Angel’s next steps seem
likely to take him to Venezuela and Colombia.
But Belize, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Panama
are a real challenge. And it is in Peru that it
is intended to complete the South American
map, but here the difficulties seem to be
bigger, and even the support of the Spanish
Olympic Committee itself have not managed
to open any doors, not even a little bit.
Sometimes tears,
sometimes smiles
The difficulties of this job are many. Having
everything programmed and then suddenly
being forced to fall back on his experience as
a teacher, as a sportsman or as an organiser
is something which José Angel Nieto Poblete
has been used to for a long time. The opportunities can arise when he least expects them,
and they cannot be wasted. In the space of
a single hour, there could be a contact in a
college, an interview with a Minister, a press
conference and a lecture to a large audience. In the meanwhile - the most delicate
part – it’s vital to determine the best time to
seek financing for projects, since “impossible
missions” don’t exist for José Angel.
The José Angel Nieto Poblete project has
in many ways only just begun, but the “first
volume” of his stories ends here. It is fair,
therefore, to give him the word at this point:
“I really can’t say that one country is more
suited to orienteering than another, or that
one country likes orienteering more than the
other. No! The level of interest for this sport is
the same everywhere, it is huge. The big problem lies in the means to develop it, the real
possibilities of doing it, time, space... life!”
“Above all, I pursue my goals with the memory of my first day, that day in February 1984
when I did my first orienteering course, when
I fell in love with this amazing sport. Perhaps
I may now have a different perspective, but
I remain faithful to my roots and I always
remember, as an example, after many, many
Clinics, a phrase from one of my students in
Haiti: ‘Teacher, don’t leave us alone.’ “
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Guatemala: The first steps
“As in the case of Argentina in relation to Uruguay, Guatemala also came my way for reasons of proximity to Costa Rica. Trying to take maximum advantage of the resources I had in hand, in one of my trips
to Costa Rica I contacted Erick Velasquez, participant in an International Event Advisers Clinic that I had
taught in Uruguay. Aiming to introduce orienteering in that country, we have programmed two phases
of work during which we have constructed the foundations of the Guatemalan Orienteering Association, chaired by Alby Aguilar. Courses, conferences, institutional protocols and the organisation of the
first Orienteering Championships in Guatemala are part of the work undertaken.”
Costa Rica: The first Central American country
“In Costa Rica, where I have always felt there are great difficulties in introducing and consolidating the
sport, our project was developed through the University of Costa Rica. At the Atlantic Pole in Turrialba,
Professor Edwin Coto saw in orienteering a major discipline for the project of linking Physical Education
and the Environment. So he asked Yeimi Jimenez to prepare the project for subsequent implementation
in the University. The idea has been consolidated over the three phases of a project that has acquired the
status of International Cooperation, and orienteering is now part of the scholar curricula at the University.
For me it was clear from the beginning that the project should not be confined to the University, and
there are already two Orienteering Associations in the country. The 4th National Orienteering Championships is an event that is expected to set new organisational standards in the country.”
Ecuador: “Keep on working so that the balloon keeps flying”
“Ecuador once saw a sports movement connected with orienteering that didn’t work. From my
contacts and inquiries, I got to speak with the current Technical Director Edison Rivera, and we have
programmed a set of activities that we could take forward with the support of Francisco Jácome, the
President of the Ecuadorian Orienteering Federation. From my first visit to Ecuador I had this conviction
that I would return very quickly and so it was. I returned to the country only seven months later and I
was surprised by an important federative organisational chart that showed six registered clubs. It has
been clear to me, since then, that it is necessary to keep on working so that the balloon keeps flying.”
Paraguay and Bolivia:“The route is set”
“Paraguay and Bolivia are countries not far from Uruguay and I also wanted to throw some seeds there.
It’s not easy to work in places where there is absolutely nothing: no material or maps, no knowledge, not
even people with whom to make contact. In discussions, doubt about interest in the sport is a constant.
But we made a major investment and, in two phases carried out in each country, we took orienteering to
the schools and sports institutions in the country, and even exposed it at two international congresses
of the International Federation of Physical Education, one in Ciudad del Este (Paraguay) and the other in
Santa Cruz de la Sierra (Bolivia). There is a long way to go in these countries, but the route is set.”
Chile: “We’ll have a surprise”
“After a long period of intense communication with Carlos Saldias, President of the Orienteering Federation of Chile, I visited the country with the main goal of unifying the orienteering activities, which the
Chileans are cleverly achieving. A large number of activities in several regions have contributed to this
condition and, very soon, we’ll have a surprise.”
Argentina: Unifying the efforts of a divided country
“For reasons of geographical vicinity with Uruguay, I visited Argentina offering to Oswaldo Bianchi, President of the Orienteering Federation of Argentina, the chance to boost orienteering and unify the efforts
of a divided country. It wasn’t easy to get in but, to my big satisfaction, when I said farewell after a visit of
only six days, the President put his hand on my shoulder and said to me: ‘José Angel, I always thought you
were coming on vacation’. That line represented the best premium to the work we were already doing and
was undoubtedly a sentence of positive evaluation. Since then, I have taught three advanced Orienteering
Clinics and held numerous lectures and conferences, having multiplied the number of activities organised
by the Federation.”
10
Haiti: A dream called Orienteering
“In Cuba I had the chance of doing some activities in EIEFD – an international school of Physical Education and sport. An important centre for the teaching of Physical Education and a worldwide reference,
I define the EIEFD as ‘a school of schools’, where the values of discipline, companionship, friendship,
camaraderie, integration and work go hand in hand with the cultural diversity offered by more than
a thousand students from 84 countries. Of course this rich experience would leave some fruit, one of
which was called Haiti. Here, with one of my students, Edison Auguste, I taught a course whose aim
was to prepare technicians who would promote orienteering all over the country. As in other countries
and according to the needs, I gave them educational and competition materials and I drew a map. This
is the starting point for the development of a sport that, for the people in Haiti – and I speak with the
heart in my hands – is a dream.”
Dominican Republic: Debut in the Student Games
“After Cuba, I felt I had to consolidate the Caribbean map with the Dominican
Republic, whose reference was Martin Quesada. This drove me to Yohalis Acosta, currently the President of the Dominican Orienteering Federation. Ángel
Danilo Mesa, Executive Director of the National Institute of Physical Education,
quickly realized the qualities inherent in orienteering, investing in it from the
first moment. On my first visit to the Dominican Republic, when I left the hotel
to go to the airport, I received a phone call where I was told that the Minister of
Education wanted to see me. But how to take this opportunity without missing
the plane? I ran the risk but it paid off. Orienteering is, for the first time, in the
Student Games as one of the debutant sports.”
Cuba: A reference in Orienteering
“Cuba has always been a reference point in sport all over the world. Regarding orienteering,
we can say it was the first Latin American country to become a member of the International
Orienteering Federation. Orienteering is in all schools and the sport is practised on a massive scale throughout the island. But it is orienteering ‘turned inward’. With Fidel Bonilla,
then President of the Cuban Orienteering Federation, I saw the opportunity to update
knowledge and give a boost to prepare the country for possible international participation, a challenge that Professor Dotmaro Valdés and his team took over. It is intended that
the organisation in 2015 of the 1st International Championships in Parks and Cities, to be
held in La Habana under the aegis of INDER, the highest sporting institution in the country,
might be an organisational reference point for orienteering events in Cuba.”
Uruguay: Activities in sixteen of nineteen Departments
“The commitment of organizing the Latin Countries Cup in Uruguay was part of a project set by Víctor
Pérez, looking for the development of sport throughout the country. In the different stages of our
work, I have organised activities in sixteen of nineteen Departments of Uruguay, including several
courses, contact with institutions and media, conferences, map-making, and much else. Thousands of
kilometres travelled and not many hours of rest – hardly slept! – that had its climax with the organisation of the 20th Latin Countries Cup.”
11
Group photo of Brazilian
MTB orienteers at an
event.
Spreading
MTB Orienteering
across the world
12
Chun-ho Ho, Hong Kong
How to improve the popularity
of MTB Orienteering
Last August, a local club organised
an informal MTB Orienteering even
t
in Hong Kong. An orienteering map
was adapted to the scale 1: 15000,
highlighting the permanent cycling
tracks with coloured lines and
showing dangerous areas. This is the
beginning of an adventure that
faces a long and difficult future, as
it is anything but easy to organise formal MTB orienteering events
in Hong Kong. Chun-ho Ho, foot
orienteer, passionate about TrailO for
ten years now and also starting
to gain an interest in MTB orienteer
ing, explains why: “There are many
other road users, road traffic is usua
lly heavy everywhere, the competitors must obey the law when crossing
the road and the mountain tracks
are too narrow to use together with
hikers. This means that an event
would not be approved by the relev
ant authority on the grounds of
inadequate public safety.”
The truth is that biking is a very pop
ular leisure activity in Hong Kong.
There are many permanent cycling
tracks in different regions of the
territory, and also around ten mountain
bike trails shared with hikers on
the mountain. A mountain bike even
t that has a social cause for local
hospitals, for example, associated with
it, easily gathers a thousand participants. Why is there no MTB orien
teering, then? “Not enough route
choices are the main problem. Orie
nteering requires good map reading
skills. The orienteer should find the
fastest way going from one control
point to another. Although there are
many tracks in Hong Kong, they
are not complex enough”, says Ho.
However Ho thinks that “providing
an interesting activity for the public
can improve MTBO’s popularity.
The course setter has to set an easie
r course with one-way flow for
the competitors, so avoiding traffic
congestion and safety problems.”
Increasing participation in local orien
teering is the main focus, not just
in Foot or Trail Orienteering but also
MTBO.
The Orienteering Association of Hon
g Kong will organise the first Bike
Orienteering event by the Federatio
n for one of the sports activities of
the Sha Tin Festival in February 2015
, and other things will follow. To
compare with top athletes is out of
the question for now, but things
are likely to change in the future. At
least this is what one can take from
Ho’s last words: “We have good terra
in for Sprint events. Reducing mapreading time and mistakes, improvin
g speed and control, and strengthening other factors during the com
petition may bring us closer to the
World MTB Orienteering Champion
ships podium. We have an Olympic
medallist in cycling already, why not
in MTBO?”
Presenting MTB orienteering in Hong Kong.
13
think fast, and be technically proficient with
your bike handling all at the same time. It is
both a mental and physical test all in one.”
Taking the sport to the people
South Africa has a very progressive mountain
biking community with a huge number of
mountain bikers, and also boasts some of the
world’s best trails and stage races, like the
Cape Epic. May this fact be decisive for the development and consolidation of the discipline
in the future? Brian’s opinion is “yes”: “Riders
are always looking for a new challenge, and
we are hoping that many more mountain
bikers will try out MTBO and find their next
level in mountain biking. I think it is all down
to marketing and advertising of MTBO, and
taking the sport to the people.”
The first MTB Orienteering race in South Africa
was way back in 2008, but it has only been
in the last three years that efforts have been
made to increase the popularity of the sport.
There are only five or six races on the South
African calendar for the whole year, but the
number of participants, currently in the order
of 50-60 at each event, continues to rise.
The organisers of MTB Orienteering in South
Africa have great support from the South
African Orienteering Federation, and this is
a very important point for the growth of the
discipline in the future.
Mapping new and exciting areas to practice
MTB orienteering, increasing the number of
registered events on the calendar of events
and involving the mountain biking community are the great challenges facing the
country’s MTBO organisers. Then – only then
– may the conditions be created to get people
competing at the highest level. “Who knows?”
Brian says. “But I will have to leave my real job
and become a professional mountain biker in
South Africa first, before I can really compete
with the top European MTB orienteers”, he
concludes.
Brian Gardner, South Africa
Having recently discovered MTB orienteering,
Brian Gardner was in Sweden this summer,
where he had the opportunity to participate
at O-Ringen. “The most incredible experience”, he says, marked by a warm reception
from all the other competitors: “They were
so excited to have people from another
Continent at a World Cup event; it was a really
good vibe”, recalls Brian. Coming from an
adventure racing background, Brian considers
that “navigating using a bike and map-board
comes as second nature”, and seeing in MTBO
“an incredible sport, as you really need to
Kusworo Rahadyan, Indonesia
“Continuous improvement”
MTB orienteering showed up in Indonesia for
the first time in 2012, and the first organised
event took place the following year. With Foot
Orienteering consolidated and occupying
an important place in the sporting interests
of nature lovers, the Federation Orienteering National of Indonesia felt the need to
move forward with the introduction of MTB
orienteering in the country, focusing on a particular group of athletes: the mountain bikers.
The large number of mountain biking events
organized in that country is an element facilitating the development of MTB orienteering,
and the responsiveness shown by the mountain biking community allows the future to be
faced in a very positive way.
Kusworo Rahadyan is one of the visible faces
of this project. A foot orienteering athlete, he
finds in MTB orienteering an excellent complement to his other sporting activity. To him,
the most interesting part in MTB orienteering
14
is that it is not just cycling. On top of the map
reading and the challenge of choosing the
best routes, there is the attention to detail
and the need to maintain maximum concentration levels. “For me it’s more challenging,
more fun and absolutely more than just cycling. And I am always sharing these reasons
with our MTB community”, said Kusworo.
MTB orienteering in Indonesia is still an
infant sport. Therefore the events organised
now have local character and small dimension. But MTBO’s development is a reality
and expectations are high. “When are we
going to see an Indonesian athlete on the
podium of a World Cup stage?” wonders
Kusworo Rahadyan. The answer couldn’t be
more assertive: ”Within five years from 2015,
hopefully. We will have the first national
MTBO competition in the middle of next
year, and the following years will be ones of
continuous improvement.”
MTBO in Brazil: growing
slowly, but... growing!
The lists of participants in the first two World MTB
Orienteering Championships, in 2002 in France and
2004 in Australia, show the name of Marco Farinazzo,
nationality: Brazil. But the next time Brazil featured
was with Barbara Bomfim and Jonas Junker in 2012
in Hungary. That same year the Ceará Orienteering
Federation organised the Trophy Ceará MTBO, the first
MTB orienteering event ever in Brazil, attended by 33
athletes from eight clubs: proper seeds were at last
being sown.
Tania Maria Jesus de Carvalho is an example of an increasing number of adventure sports lovers, especially
foot orienteers, to be attracted by MTB orienteering.
The biggest name in Brazilian orienteering, Tania
participates for the Almirante Adalberto Nunes Sports
Association (ADAAN), a club in the Orienteering Federation of Rio de Janeiro. “In Rio de Janeiro the Brazilian Navy, through the civil club ADAAN, has in the last
two years promoted an annual MTBO competition”,
says Tania. “Naval Commander Rubens Igreja, member
of ADAAN and passionate about MTB orienteering, is
very keen to get the discipline known and practised”.
In early 2013 the Brazilian Orienteering Confederation
published official MTBO Rules based on IOF Guidelines, an important step towards the standardization
of procedures in the country.
15
US MTBO Tour 2014
A whole-USA initiative
in MTB Orienteering
Mountain Bike Orienteering in the United
States is seeking to assert itself. Promoted by
Orienteering USA and with the help of the
International Orienteering Federation, the
“coast to coast” MTBO Tour 2014 has brought
new life to this discipline in the US.
A little look at orienteering’s history in the
United States shows that the first orienteering events in the country were held
on 10th November 1941, at Dartmouth
College in Hanover, N.H., but it wasn’t until
the 1960s that orienteering really began
to take off on this continent, and the USA’s
first National Orienteering Championships
were held in 1970. MTB Orienteering (MTBO)
came much later, and the first support for
a national team came two years ago when
Susan Grandjean, Rebecca Jensen and Abra
McNair took part in that year’s World MTBO
Orienteering Championships (WMTBOC) in
Hungary. Which led to a couple of questions:
Would there now be a push for more local
and regional events? And would we see a
real effort to get American MTBO on to the
US map, the land where the mountain bike
first became popular?
Presentation in Newport, Kentucky, for Orienteering Cincinnati and adventure racers at
Reser Bikeshop. Photo: Magnus Wallenborg
16
While these and other questions awaited an
answer, Susan Grandjean and Abra McNair
took part again in the WMTBOC in Estonia in
2013, this time in the company of Susan Sherman and a complete team for the Men’s Elite
class. The performances left the Americans in
the lower places in the standings, but their
determination and enthusiasm were not
diminished by that. On the contrary, the US
MTBO Team completed its third excursion to
the WMTBOC and their first entry to the World
Masters MTBO Championships in Poland this
year.
The team had a wet start to begin the week
of MTBO racing on the soggy forest trails of
Bialystok in Poland, but managed to ‘find their
pedals’ and achieved a number of personal
best performances. It’s in this context of
growth that we arrive at September this year
and the US MTBO Tour.
Events, presentations and
meetings
The US MTBO Tour 2014 was designed
with the goal of assessing the potential for
promoting the development of MTBO in
the USA and, at the same time, considering
the possibilities for future IOF MTBO events
there. Under the auspices of the IOF and
Orienteering USA, the Tour was organised
by Magnus Wallenborg, a member of the IOF
MTB Orienteering Commission and Greg Lennon, the Orienteering USA’s Vice President of
Clubs & MTB Orienteering leader. From New
Jersey to Portland, Oregon, the Tour included
three MTBO events, three presentations and
five meetings. In addition, nine areas in seven
states were assessed for possible elite MTBO
use. The organisers finished with a feeling of
fruitful work done for a worthy cause.
The first stop was at Huntington State Park
for an awesome MTBO event hosted by Joe
Brautigam and the Western Connecticut
Orienteering Club. The Tour’s 2nd event was
organised by Dave Ashley and the Quantico
Orienteering Club at Lake Accotink Park,
Springfield, Virginia on the final day of US
National Orienteering Week; this event had
more than 50 participants.
Terrain assessment around Bend, Oregon, by Tour organisers Greg Lennon (USA) and Magnus Wallenborg (SWE).
Bike shops and even a brewery were perfect
places for the meetings and presentations
through the week. The competitive part of the
Tour ended at Mount Tabor Park, Portland,
Oregon, with an event put on by US MTBO
Team members. The Tour concluded with a
meeting with Tom Lomax, Director of Operations for the Mount Bachelor Mountain Bike
Park and Ski area in Bend, Oregon.
Good potential, but some hurdles
to overcome
After over 7,300 kilometres by road in 11
days, the result of the hard work was decidedly positive. Magnus Wallenborg and Greg
Lennon found numerous places with high
potential for hosting major MTB Orienteering events, reporting that “there is definitely
enthusiasm for expanding the sport of MTBO
on both recreational and competitive
levels in the United States.” They recognise
“good potential to grow the sport in the US,
especially among individuals seeking new
challenges, for example, adventure racers and
orienteers”, pointing to the very positive fact
that “individuals showing interest in MTBO
are on average younger than the current foot
orienteers.”
But it was clear that the general lack of awareness of what the sport entails, and more specifically the lack of technical expertise, stands
in the way of allowing this enthusiasm to
manifest itself in more events and more athletes. Also the number of mountain bike ori-
enteers in the United States who have some
international experience in this discipline is
currently quite limited, which constrains the
possibilities for holding international MTBO
competitions, at least at the moment.
Future priorities
Learning MTBO mapping standards, attending international MTBO events and promoting training camps and workshops for Event
Advisers have been identified as essential
elements in MTBO development requiring
additional support from both the IOF and Orienteering USA – and a lot of work for the US
MTBO enthusiasts. In addition, strategies have
to be found to support the training of mappers and tour promoters in order to increase
the quality and quantity of mapped terrain,
events and athletes in the United States.
Championships. As an event overseen by
IOF Event Advisers, a high standard would
be set that would serve as a role model for
subsequent MTBO events. It would also be
an attractive event to attend for anyone in
the United States, since it would have high
status and would be well promoted in advance. Attendees, especially Masters, would
hopefully stay highly motivated to organise
local events and support the development of
both recreational and competitive athletes in
their regions. Are we going to see, soon, an
application to host the World Masters MTB
Orienteering Championships and/or a World
Cup round in the United States? We’ll see.
One thing is sure: The future will be what the
Americans want.
Magnus Wallenborg presents his own country
as a role model: “Sweden organised the World
Masters MTB Orienteering Championships
together with a World Cup round in 2011, and
many of those Swedes who took part in the
Masters events are today part of the MTBO
community in Sweden. They have continued
to take part in MTBO events as well as helping
to develop the sport locally by organising
events and converting standard orienteering
maps into MTBO maps”, he says.
The hope would be that a similar dynamic
would result from a World Masters Championships held together with a National US MTBO
17
IOF General Assembly 2006, together with Vice President Marcel
Schiess (SUI) and President Åke
Jacobson (SWE).
At the SportAccord
Convention 2014.
Photo: Anna Jacobson
18 years of service to
international orienteering
IOF Secretary General Barbro Rönnberg has
decided to leave her post after 18 years in office. Barbro assumed the role of IOF Secretary
General on 2nd September 1996.
At the time of her appointment, she assumed responsibility for the management
of an international sports federation of 48
nations. At the time of her retirement from
the position, the IOF has a membership of 78
nations – an international sports federation
well positioned to meet the challenges of the
twenty-first century.
Barbro brought to the IOF expertise in marketing, media, public relations, leadership,
management, finances and communications
together with, very significantly, high level
interpersonal skills. Since 1996, she led the
Secretariat (now Office) through a significant
and exciting period of IOF expansion and
change and adeptly addressed the growing
complexities facing a dynamic international
sports organisation. Her positive and productive relationship with individual people within
both the IOF structure and national and
international federations was a hallmark of
her period in office.
Barbro provided decisive and strategic leadership to ensure the professional element of the
IOF was integral in the formulation, consideration and successful implementation of IOF priorities and policy. She provided untold support to
volunteer personnel. Her timely, sound advice
over many years to Presidents, IOF Council and
commissions was always well received, very
much appreciated and seen as invaluable.
While in office, Barbro was instrumental in
developing IOF relations with other sports
bodies in the international arena. She made
the sport of orienteering, and the IOF, well
known, and respected, in the most important
sports circles and became actively engaged
in organisations recognised by the Interna-
At the SportAccord Convention 2013 in St Petersburg together with Aleksandr Bliznevskiy (Russian Federation), Brian Porteous, Anna Jacobson and Eivind Tonna.
18
tional Olympic Committee such as the Association of Recognised International Sports
Federations (ARISF) – where Barbro held the
position of Secretary General for 8 years –
Sport Accord, International Masters Games
Association (IMGA) and International World
Games Association providing, in a natural
way, opportunities to promote and position
orienteering.
In recognition of eighteen years of significant
achievement, dedicated service, unquestionable loyalty and exceptional commitment
to the IOF, Barbro Rönnberg was awarded
the IOF Silver Pin in 2006 and the Gold Pin
in 2014 – clear acknowledgement of the
esteem in which she is held by the world
orienteering community.
All in the IOF wish Barbro Rönnberg a fulfilling
future.
Thank you Barbro.
WITH
NOKIAN TYRES
Official IOF Partner
ORIENTEERING WORLD•2014 19
www.nokiantyres.com
Foot Orienteering
BY ERIK BORG
At the World Orienteering Championships,
Judith was the only athlete with more than one
gold medal. “It’s incredible how it ended,” she
smiles. She summarises 2014 like this: “What
an amazing year! It´s just unbelievable when
almost everything you have dreamed about
becomes reality!”
Judith’s Swiss colleague Simone Niggli dominated women’s orienteering from 2001 to 2013,
winning 23 World Championships golds in all.
Now she has retired from international competition, and immediately the Alpine country has
welcomed a new star; Judith ended up with
six international golds in 2014. “I don’t actually
think of that. I had an amazing year and I’m very
proud of what I have achieved. Simone had
similar successful years over a long period. I will
never compare myself with her.”
Judith had been one of the best in the world
for some years, with results such as bronze in
Middle Distance at World Orienteering Championships 2011 and gold in the World Championships Relay the year after. In 2014 Judith has
been the best. “There has come bigger interest
from the media since Simone has stopped. It
wasn’t like that earlier, when everyone was
thinking that it will be some years before
Simone will stop.”
Niggli wasn’t only just a big star; she was also
a person who shared her knowledge. “I have
learnt a lot from her about orienteering technique during many talks together,” Judith says.
The perfect start
A year to remember
for Judith Wyder
The Swiss athlete Judith Wyder has had a memorable year: she
won three out of the four possible gold medals at the European Championships in Portugal, and three golds and a bronze
at the World Orienteering Championships in Italy.
20
In the streets of Venice, Judith did the expected
at the start of the World Championships by
winning the Sprint. Her fourth run in a Sprint
Final at the World Championships ended in the
best way possible. “I have learnt from earlier
mistakes,” she smiled. World Championships
got off to a fine start on a sunny day with lots
of spectators in the centre of the world-famous
city. “To win my first individual gold in Venice
felt very special. I had looked forward to that
event for many years. I’ve always liked Venice
and its special architecture a lot! Last but not
least, it was a very special moment to have my
sister there together with my boy-friend and my
parents. It was the first time I have performed
well when my sister was present. I still feel lots
of emotion when thinking back to Venice.”
Judith felt that the surroundings and public
interest were just perfect in Venice. She also
likes the tricky town Sprints in narrow streets
that one finds in Italy. “It was a special World
Championships race, what with going to the
start by boat and being able to run in one of the
most interesting cities in Europe. I always felt
very safe when running, and took quite a lot of
time to read the map carefully, as I had planned
to. Still, I think the course could have been a bit
trickier for me.”
The Sprint was followed up with gold medals
in both the relays. Judith was also the anchor in
both of them. “Of course the Sprint was amazing, but the two relay run-ins together with
my team-mates were just what I have always
dreamed about.”
Variety during the year
Judith has grown up in an orienteering family
and started to run alone when she was eight to
ten years old.
– When did you begin to believe that you had
special talent?
“I don’t really think I have that. The main reason
for me doing well is a strong will to become
better, plus a lot of work and patience and also
a lot of good help from others.” The 26-year-old
athlete is a physiotherapist. For about half of
the year she is working about 50% of full time.
“I like to have something more than sport to
concentrate on for most of the year,” she says.
Judith has also done well in ski orienteering. For
three years she was a student at the ski orienteering gymnasium in Mora in Sweden, and has
one medal from Junior World Championships
in each of foot orienteering and ski orienteering.
Going to Tasmania
On the way to the European Orientee
ring Championships in Portugal
and World Championships in Italy,
Judith Wyder skipped the World Cup
races in Norway and Spain, preferrin
g to concentrate on the European
and World Championships. She neve
rtheless ended second overall in
the World Cup. The coming season
will be a bit different. Judith starts
already in January when the World
Cup begins in Australia. “I will take
part in Tasmania and will fight for the
overall World Cup. I think it would
be nice if more athletes could run in
the whole World Cup programme
in the future. So after not focusing
on the World Cup last year, I will put
more energy into it next year.”
– And can you improve your level furth
er?
“I am continuing my work with orien
teering skills and running. If I can get
better in these two areas I will be able
to fight for medals again next year.”
The Swede Tove Alexandersson, with
two silver and two bronze medals from the World Orienteering Cham
pionships, won the World Cup
overall.
Judith Wyder celebrating
victory in the first-ever Sprint
Relay at the World Orienteering Championships.
Photo: Rémy Steinegger,
steineggerpix.com
21
First women’s
gold for Russia
Svetlana Mironova became the first woman individual
World Orienteering Championships winner from Russia when she took the Long Distance title. She is from
Nizhni Novgorod, 450 kilometres east of Moscow.
Since March 2013 she has been a full-time sportsperson and has taken new steps forward. “It gives me so
much pleasure to be orienteering, working with maps
and being together with orienteering friends,” she
tells. In 2012 she was one of the team taking the firstever Russian women’s gold in relay at either European
or World Championships, when winning the Relay at
the European Championships in Sweden.
Annika Billstam – going on for more
Annika Billstam took her second World Championships gold in winning the Middle Distance. Her first
was in the Long Distance in 2011. This second gold
was taken at 38 years old, and she says she will go
on: “It was a simple decision to go on. I’m still passionate about my sport.” In the autumn of 2013 she
was thinking a lot about whether or not to continue,
and since then she has concentrated on the World
Championships and skipped a lot of big races like
the European Championships. She still has one very
big wish. “My goal for 2015, apart from doing well
at the World Championships, is mainly to enjoy the
sport I love and inspire others,” says Annika, whose
partner is the French star Thierry Gueorgiou.
Gold medals to five nations
Among the men, athletes from five different nations
took gold at the World Championships. The individual ones were won by Thierry Gueorgiou, France,
Olav Lundanes, Norway and Søren Bobach, Denmark. Gueorgiou won the Long Distance for the second time in succession. The Frenchman now has 12
gold medals, and he will be competing again next
year. Thierry had Middle Distance as his main goal,
but he was disqualified on that distance after not
visiting one of the controls. Olav Lundanes was the
only man with a medal from both Middle and Long
and took first place on the Middle. He has previously
had two victories on the Long. He lost motivation in
2013, but was back to his best this year.
Sweden’s men won the classic Relay at both EOC
and WOC, with Gustav Bergman as the anchor both
times, and Switzerland won the Mixed Sprint Relay
at WOC.
The best of the Swiss this year, Daniel Hubmann,
won two golds at the European Championships. At
the World Championships he ended up with three
silver medals.
22
Søren Bobach on his way to
Sprint gold in Venice, Italy.
Photo: Rémy Steinegger,
steineggerpix.com
Foot Orienteering
Denmark won the
Unofficial Sprint
Relay World Cup in
2014.
Photo: Erik Borg
F
or years there have been Danes among
the world’s best, but 2014 became the ‘dynamite year’. The runners from the Nordic
country took almost as many medals in one
World Championships as ever before overall.
The Sprint on the first day of the World Championships became a fantastic day for Denmark, with one gold medal and two bronze.
Two days later, it was silver in the first-ever
World Championships Sprint Relay. Then Ida
Bobach took silver on the Middle Distance.
In the Relay on the final day, Denmark’s Maja
Alm fought for the gold on the last leg. It
ended with silver and smiles. Six medals in
total. From the 30 previous World Championships in orienteering, Denmark had won only
nine medals in all.
“The product of ten years work”
“Our results in 2014 are the product of ten
years work,” says Lars Lindstrøm, head coach
for Denmark since 2011. “It could also have
happened a year or two earlier. We have tried
The year when
‘Danish Dynamite’
became a reality!
to learn from our competitors and
also from other elite sports. All this
has been put into a Danish context,
and applied during the last ten years.
You can say we have now built a Danish
model, based on a strong training group and
setup around the national team in Aarhus.
But also a model where we place emphasis
on a very close relationship between athletes
and coaches. In general we have tried not to
be bound by tradition, but have focussed on
development and results.”
the year 2000 when he became talent coach
in North Zealand. “But it was not until I became coach of the junior team in FIF Hillerød,
2002-2004, that I realised coaching was my
dream job. In 2005 I got the chance with the
Danish junior team, and used the opportunity
to change things. This was an important period of time for me. First of all it defined me as
a coach, but I also developed a vast network
of colleagues and friends in international
orienteering and other elite sports. This is of
great use today.”
Through Team Danmark, Lindstrøm has
contacts with many successful Danish sports
like rowing, swimming, cycling, triathlon and
badminton. All national team coaches meet
regularly throughout the year and share
knowledge. “It is a huge inspiration, not only
for the physical aspects of orienteering but as
much on all other aspects. Even for our orienteering technical training we sometimes get
inspired by other very different sports.” Orienteering is becoming a sport other elite sports
also find inspiring, and in mid-November
Lindstrøm was asked to share his knowledge
at a PhD seminar in Copenhagen.
Three years ago he became responsible for all
national teams, and became national coach of
the senior team. “I’m doing this because I truly
believe I can make a difference. The biggest
challenge is getting everybody – runners,
coaches, board members and the rest of Danish orienteering – to understand what it took
get here, and what it will take to stay at this
level or improve further.”
Very well prepared Sprint winner
Søren Bobach brought Denmark its fourth
World Championships gold by winning the
Sprint. The 25-year-old athlete had been preparing for the sprint performance for months
both with mental and physical training.
Together with a lot of other Danes, he had
been meeting every Monday and discussing
sprint maps and route choices. Just before
the Championships he was running on stairs
to train for smooth crossings over the canal
bridges in Venice.
“It’s difficult to say how important the bridge
training was for the result and my winning
margin of two seconds, but it’s obvious that I
became better in bridge crossing,” Bobach says.
“Coaching is my dream job”
Lars Lindstrøm started his coaching career in
The Head Coach doesn’t expect the same
results in 2015. “The goal of 2015 will be the
same as for 2014. We hope for three medals;
that has been our goal for 3 years now and
this will not change. The second objective for
2015 is to bed in our Danish model and so
secure future Danish successes.”
– The hunger for success is maybe not so big now?
“First of all we are very proud of what we
achieved, but at the same time we are also
humble, knowing that next year will be
an even bigger challenge. Most likely we
will not achieve equally strong results, but
less can do for us as well. The hunger for
more, and the task of convincing the whole
of Danish Orienteering that even harder
and more focused work is needed, is the
biggest challenge we have met so far. Elite
sport is extremely demanding, and if you
stop for a second and relax others will win
the medals instead. It is just like normal
orienteering races, if you don’t work hard
with both your technical and physical
capacity during a race, others will beat you
in the end.”
23
Ski Orienteering
European Ski Orienteering Championships in Russia:
Huge step forward
as a TV sport
By Erik Borg
With GPS tracking and a lot of
cameras, Ski Orienteering became a new TV sport during the
European Ski Orienteering Championships held at Tyumen, Russia
this year.
Hans Jørgen Kvåle, one of the best ski orienteering athletes in the world and also leader
of the Ski Orienteering Athletes Commission,
is very enthusiastic about ski orienteering
as a media sport after what was achieved in
Russia. “The organisers managed to show the
potential of ski orienteering as an arena and
TV sport,” he says. Live TV broadcasts from
four of the competitions were shown on Rus-
24
sian television. The competitions were also
streamed live on the internet with English
commentary.
“Earlier attempts to show ski orienteering
have been made by volunteers with very
limited budgets. Tyumen managed to show
the potential with a full-scale production, and
also managed to find all the financial support
from sources outside orienteering,” Hans Jørgen tells. In the autumn the Norwegian saw a
Russian children’s TV programme that had a
whole episode on ski orienteering. “It is obvious from this kind of thing that ski orienteering is developing.”
Even more exciting when based
in a stadium
For seven years now, Hans Jørgen has
competed at a high international level and
been an almost full-time sportsperson. “I have
been lucky to experience ski orienteering at
many different locations. To be fair, most of
the competitions that have had ‘that little
extra’ have always been held from stadiums.
For organisers, a stadium provides them with
many facilities they would struggle to provide
otherwise, and it provides a professional
frame for the event. For the teams and service
teams, a stadium also makes things much
more practical: transport, parking, ski waxing,
ski testing, possibilities for big screens, equipment changes, space for mass starts etc.”
– But is it so nice to be mostly on tracks close to
a stadium and often in and out of the arena?
“I don’t believe that the quality of the technical challenges on the courses is any lower
Photo: Petteri Kä
häri
Developing and expanding
ski orienteering
Hans Jørgen Kvåle has become heav
ily involved
in expanding ski orienteering and intro
ducing it
to new athletes. Together with his part
ner Emily
Benham, a star in mountain bike orien
teering,
he was central in organising a ski orien
teering
academy in the highlands in Turkey
last winter.
He tells about big progress in skills
during the
three-day long camp; he has himself
written a
handbook about how to train and deve
lop ski
orienteering skills.
121 athletes from nine nations took
part, and a
large number of these were locals from
Turkey.
For some of them it was a totally new
sport.
Some of those present used alpine
skis; they had
to work really hard uphill, but they
had a lot of
energy and were eager to learn mor
e.
The catalyst for staging the camp was
that
Turkey was going to organise a Wor
ld Ranking
Event. They will do the same this com
ing winter.
The President of the national federatio
n, Tekin
Çolakoğlu, has said that Turkey will
be represented at the World Ski Orienteering
Championships in Norway. Knowledge, experienc
e, media
interest and of course snow are all
very important, but the main reason for getting
growth is
another thing. “There is a need for pers
ons who
will work hard for the sport,” he says
.
when they are planned from an arena; in fact
it’s almost the opposite. A stadium passage
on skis is normally not taking more than a
maximum of 30 seconds. The organisers have
an existing track network to base their tracks
on; that makes the track preparation job
easier. At the same time, they can use more
energy on making the track network more
complex. This gives us more changes between the track sizes and higher speeds. Also
ski stadiums are normally sited in quite hilly
and complex terrain which can complicate
navigation. When passing the stadium we
normally exchange our maps, which makes
it harder to plan ahead, and you will have to
take more decisions in stressed situations.”
Big opportunities in TV
Kvåle sees really big opportunities for ski
Hans Jørgen Kvåle is getting optimistic for
the future of ski orienteering as a TV sport.
Photo: Erik Borg
orienteering as a TV sport. He feels it’s easier
to understand than foot orienteering, for
people with little map knowledge, since
these winter athletes are following tracks.
“Following the tracks is just like reading
a road map. Everyone can understand ski
orienteering!”
Kvåle believes that ski orienteering can easily
be staged at the required quality level, as
soon as organisers are willing and the economic base is there. “We need someone who
can tell the story in an understandable and
exciting way. We also need to have athletes
who enjoy some status in their countries,
such as Simone Niggli has in Switzerland. This
will make the sport more attractive to follow,
and the media and resources will then come.
Ski orienteering has a very interesting future
now and we hope to be able to show this
fantastic sport to the world. I believe the Ski
Orienteering product is good enough to be
in the Olympic Games. We just need to make
the right packaging and have someone who is
able to sell it.” Kvåle can see that the product
can be built up further, perhaps with the use
of head cams.
Kvåle did very well in the European Championships: he ski-ed a splendid second leg for
the Norwegian winning team in the Relay,
and got bronze at Middle Distance. In the
World Cup overall he was second behind the
clear winner Andrei Lamov from Russia.
25
Photo: Elena Fedotova / ESOC 2014
Ski Orienteering
Andrei Lamov – clear World Cup victor
Andrei Lamov of Russia won a very clear victory overall in the World Cup last winter, plus
one gold at the European Championships on
home ground and both distances at the ‘preWSOC’ races.
“My main goal for the World Championships
(WSOC - to be held in Norway) is to be on top
form at the time,” Lamov says. “If I am at my
best I think I can fight on any distance.” He
has three gold medals on different distances
and he is searching for the missing ones from
the Middle Distance and Mixed Relay.
“The traditional Relay is also something that
I always look forward to. The Scandinavian
teams are strong in this kind of competition,
and therefore it is fun and honourable to beat
them,” he smiles.
– You won both distances at the pre-WSOC
races, organised just 10–15 kilometres away
from where the World Championships will
be …
“I think the kind of orienteering in Budor
won’t be the same as in Gåsbu at pre-WSOC
as we had a lot of wide ski tracks last year.
Looking at the maps for the coming Championships, I can assume that the main challenge
will be to be quite skilled in keeping a high
speed on narrow tracks, which can have a lot
26
of bends in Norway. Especially on the Long
Distance it will require a lot of upper body
power. This kind of terrain suits me well, but I
hope to see more wide tracks on the map, as
it was in Hamar (pre-WSOC) or at European
Championships in Tyumen.”
in my training last summer, and I feel they
have worked well for me. My shape is already
quite good, but I hope it will be even better
by February. I also think I’ve picked up much
experience in recent years; I hope this will
help me to succeed in Norway.”
Last winter the 28-year-old won four of the
twelve races in the World Cup and had a
quite comfortable overall win – he scored 600
points in all. The gap to Hans Jørgen Kvåle in
second place was 136 points. At the European Championships in Russia he won the
Sprint, and got silver in the Middle and Long
Distance races and the Relay. “I see no difference in racing on home ground or far away.
Everything depends on you and your current
shape. I believe that if you are going to be
good, you have to be capable of showing
your best in different conditions.”
Andrei spends most of his time on ski orienteering, but he also works as a personal coach
and helps to organise some orienteering in
his home region.
He liked the challenges on home ground.
“The terrain in Tyumen suited me well, with
the big ski stadium and many ski tracks
around it. I liked that a lot. I’m glad that I was
so consistent during the whole week at the
European Championships, and that gives me
much self-confidence for the coming season.”
Lamov has been one of the very best in the
world for a few years now, but he still sees
ways to improve. “I made some changes
Among the women it was again Russia at
the top of the World Cup table. Tatiana
Rvacheva won by just 15 points ahead of Tove
Alexandersson, Sweden. Alexandersson won
the Middle Distance at the European Championships. Mervi Pesu, Finland, and Hana
Hancikova, Czech Republic, also won one gold
each. Among the men Stanimir Belomazhev,
Bulgaria and Vladimir Barchukov, Russia
became gold medal winners together with
Lamov. Russia won the Mixed Relay and the
Finnish women and Norwegian men took the
Relay gold medals.
At the coming World Championships,
Sweden’s Peter Arnesson is the reigning
champion on all individual distances. He
didn’t get any medal at all at the European
Championships last winter, but he is ready for
some hard fights in Norway.
Trail Orienteering
Stars of the season:
Michael Johansson and Martin Jullum
By Clive Allen
The 2014 season was a busy one
for the world’s elite trail orienteers. Not only was there both a
World (WTOC) and a European
(ETOC) Championships, in Italy
and Portugal respectively in conjunction with the footO equivalents, there was also an unofficial
European Cup covering 12 competitions in six different countries,
with the best 5 results to count.
Let’s start with the athletes who
made the headlines in 2014.
In gold medal terms, the most successful trail
orienteer in 2014 is Michael Johansson, Sweden, who won the Paralympic class in PreO,
the ‘traditional’ trailO format, in both Italy and
Portugal. Sweden’s Ola Jansson was silver
medallist in both events; bronze at the World
Championships went to John Crosby, Great
Britain and at the European Championships to
Pekka Seppä, Finland.
but behind the Latvian Guntars Mankus who
achieved more than he had ever dreamed of
in getting the gold, and ahead of Geir Myhr
Øien, Norway who took the bronze.
To everyone else’s surprise and perhaps
also theirs, Croatia won the WTOC Team
gold medals when the three team members
simultaneously delivered peak performances.
Sweden took silver and Latvia bronze. More
on Croatia later.
Convincing TempO winners
Two well-known young trail orienteers,
Martin Jullum, Norway and Antti Rusanen,
Finland won the gold medals in TempO (the
all-against-the-clock form of the sport) in the
WTOC and ETOC competitions respectively,
in both cases quite convincingly. Winner of
the first-ever WTOC TempO event in 2013,
Finland’s Pinja Mäkinen, was bronze medallist
this time just behind fellow-Finn Lauri Kontkanen. With a bronze medal in the European
TempO event, Marit Wiksell is the only trail
orienteer to win three IOF medals in 2014;
silver medallist in this competition was her
uncle, Lennart Wahlgren.
Martin Jullum has arguably been the most
successful Open class trail orienteer this year,
winning the European Cup overall in addition
to his WTOC TempO gold. In the Cup he had
four victories, including winning both of the
two counting O-Ringen competitions, and
scored 236 points out of a possible 250. “The
2014 season was certainly my best season so
far,” says Martin. “I have been very happy with
my performances over the last couple of seasons as a whole, and this year I finally manage
to perform as I wanted to at WTOC. Climbing
all the way to the top of the podium was
simply amazing. Winning the European Cup
(and also O-ringen) with so big margins was
also out of range from what I could expect
beforehand.”
Jullum’s closest challenger in the European
Cup was Martin Fredholm, Sweden who
scored 212.
Michael Johansson, formerly an active
orienteer on foot and on skis, started taking trail orienteering seriously 7 years ago
after a skiing accident left him with a badly
damaged hip and pelvis. This has been his
most successful season by far. “It’s great to
manage to take two gold medals in the same
year. I had built up my confidence and I liked
the courses, so I felt I had a good chance
for the gold; without the confidence I think
this diminishes the chances. It was then
that I hoped there might be luck and skill
in combination. One gold would have been
wonderful! Two are almost too good to be
true, along also with team silver medals in
both Championships.”
Team gold medals for Croatia
Jari Turto (Finland), Open class PreO World
Champion in 2013, won the European Championships Open class by the small matter of
18 seconds difference at the timed controls
from his compatriot Antti Rusanen, with
Marit Wiksell, Sweden third. Marit was one
place higher at the World Championships,
Martin Jullum: international
success in both PreO and
TempO.
Photo: Joaquim Margarido
27
Trail Orienteering
Marit Wiksell – full concentration at the timed control.
Photo: Joaquim Margarido
25 nations at World Championships
The World Trail Orienteering Championships
in Italy attracted exactly 100 competitors from
25 different nations, a new record. On Day1
of the PreO competition, the course had to
be shortened to only 12 tasks plus the two
timed controls; this was because heavy rain
in the period immediately beforehand had
rendered the tracks in one section impassable
for wheelchairs and those having difficulty in
walking.
The European Cup comprised 12 competitions, 11 PreO and 1 TempO, held in Finland,
Lithuania, Latvia, Sweden, Denmark and the
Czech Republic. An Event Adviser clinic was
held in conjunction with the Sweden events,
which were two of those held in O-Ringen
week. One competitor – Lars Jacob Waaler
from Norway – attended every European
Cup competition and was rewarded with an
overall fourth place. Several others missed
only one venue, and in all 236 competitors
participated in one or more competitions.
ers led by Damir Gobec; the venues are the
capital Zagreb and the nearby town Karlovac.
There will again be a European Cup in 2015,
this time comprising 10 competitions and taking in Finland, Lithuania, Croatia (just before
WTOC), Sweden and the Czech Republic.
Organisational challenges
TrailO has become a sophisticated sport,
with the best elite competitors setting very
high standards. This puts strong demands
on especially the map-makers and course
planners for international events, because
even very slight inaccuracies or misjudgments
on their part can turn a good course into one
which can cause controversy. Very few IOF
member nations are strong numerically in
terms of proficient trail orienteers who have
the knowledge, experience and skill to stage
an event at international level, and this puts
a big strain on the IOF Event Adviser from another country, who provides advice and some
support and quite a degree of control.
Croatian debut
In 2015 the World Trail Orienteering Championships will be held in Croatia, the first time
that country will have organised an IOF international event of any kind. The event, taking
place in late June, is in the hands of a very
enthusiastic and competent team of organis-
28
ised by countries having quite a small nucleus
of experienced trail orienteers, and credit and
thanks must go to all the volunteers involved
in producing competitions that proved challenging and fair.
TrailO in general and TempO in particular can
be quite manpower-heavy events to organise,
and inevitably many of the helpers are unfamiliar with TrailO and have to be trained up
for the tasks they undertake. This adds to the
strain for the core organising team, of course.
Both WTOC and ETOC this year were organ-
Guaranteeing fairness
Achieving proper fairness in elite trailO
has always been a hot topic, and this
year’s buzz phrase in this connectio
n is
‘zero tolerance’. No, not the phrase
beloved of politicians who crave a blitz
krieg
by the police to clamp down on som
e
form of crime; this one is about zero
answers in trailO – when none of the
kites
is at the spot marked by the circle on
the
map. The idea is to define limits for
how
close to a ‘zero’ site a kite can be plac
ed
and still be ‘fair’.
Not entirely unexpectedly, this is a
controversial move with some sayin
g that
such ‘rules’ could cramp a planners
’ style,
and there could end up being more
exceptions than not. Discussion continue
s
… In any case, greater fairness will
come
as the education of Event Advisers
and
course planners is improved.
Can TempO be
televised?
It has been said that TempO can become a
good TV sport. It has intensity, stress, extreme
skill levels and identifiable decisive moments,
all in picturesque and sometimes spectacular
terrain. The challenge is in how to portray
these elements to armchair viewers in a way
that grabs their interest. Imagine a control
station where the camera is right behind the
competitor, so the viewer has the same outlook plus same map samples shown on screen
and hears or sees the competitor’s answers
in real time. The viewer also sees the time
ticking away and can compare it with other
competitors’ times, at that station and overall.
And immediately before and after, the
viewer sees shots of the control station from
different angles, together with enlarged
pictures of the map section and an informed
commentary; the viewer is taken right into
the thinking process of the competitor in
In TempO there is pressure all the time. PreO World Champion Guntars Mankus studies the
terrain. Photo: Joaquim Margarido.
choosing the right, or a wrong, answer and
gets to feel exactly the same stress elements
as the competitor.
Editing would create a TV transmission where
the action moves to and fro between the last
3–4 stations and the best competitors, just
like in a golf match, and the tension builds
(the best start last) as the competition moves
to its climax …. Could it work?
Pin punch and control card
are still the norm in PreO.
Photo: Paula Lehtomäki
Relays and
electronic punching
There are elements of orienteering that are
standard practice in the other disciplines but
still not regular features in the trailO world.
Two of these, a trailO relay format and electronic punching, are high priority in the work
of the IOF TrailO Commission.
A demonstration relay event was held in Italy
the day after WTOC ended and produced
many interesting and constructive comments;
it is not easy to come up with a form of competition that is fair to all teams, irrespective of
how mobile the team members are.
Some trials have been conducted with electronic punching, and hopefully it won’t be too
long before trail orienteers in international
events can record their decisions by electronic
means. An electronic punching system has
the potential for providing much quicker information on how well competitors are doing,
even when they are still out on the course.
29
MTB Orienteering
Hans Jørgen Kvåle and Anton Foliforov
shared the World Championships gold
medal in Sprint. Photo: Nigel Benham
MTB Orienteering season 2014
A lot to celebrate!
Denmark, Sweden and Poland: three focal competition points in the
Mountain Bike Orienteering season that has just ended. It was there
that the world elite met in large numbers, where the key outcomes were
concentrated. From Birkerød and Skåne to Białystok and Supraśl, here
is a look over the best that happened in 2014, in a discipline where
spectacular performance and long-lasting excitement are both sides
of the same coin.
Beginning with the first of the three major
international events of the season: the MTB
Orienteering World Cup headed to Denmark
for the opening round of the 2014 edition.
The great moments of the European Cham-
30
pionships and World Junior Championships
in 2009 were still present in many riders’
memories, along with the recognized organizational quality and the challenge of the terrain around Birkerød. The natural anxiety that
comes at the beginning of each season was
clearly apparent, with the first “real” cycling
giving everyone the chance to see the effects
of their winter preparation. Expectations were
running high!
In winning the Sprint, the Russian Anton
Foliforov and the Finn Marika Hara opened
the season in the best possible way following
their overall victories in the 2013 World Cup.
The Long Distance stage had the Finnish athletes Pekka Niemi and Ingrid Stengård as the
big winners. Victories certainly tasty in both
cases, being the first by Niemi in a World Cup
stage, and for Stengård a return to the highest place of the podium, something she was
away from for almost two years. Marika Hara,
Pekka Niemi and Jussi Laurila won the Mixed
Relay for Finland on the last day of competition, with France second where, alongside
Gaëlle Barlet, Cédric Beill and Baptiste Fuchs
are emerging in a dazzling way.
But the story of this World Cup MTB orienteering 2014’s first round is completed by
other names and not only the winners. The
Norwegian Hans Jørgen Kvåle and the British
Emily Benham, the Russians Svetlana Poverina
and Olga Vinogradova and the Dane Erik Skovgaard Knudsen deserve to get a mention in
finishing a little step from the gold. With the
advance of the season, some would confirm
their good moment and get higher placings.
Others, not so much …
A new participation record
In the second half of July, 16,000 orienteers
from all around the world took the route to
northern Europe. Only a big competition like
O-Ringen (Sweden) has such power and charisma, strengthened this year by the fact that
it was celebrating its 50th anniversary. Side by
side with its ‘sisters’ Foot and Trail Orienteering, MTB Orienteering appeared prominently
in the programme, being the first discipline to
‘take the field’ and also in having three stages
counting for World Cup ranking. In addition
to the 124 athletes entered in Elite classes, we
should reflect on the 644 participants during
the three days of open competition, making
O-Ringen MTBO 2014 the competition with
the highest-ever participation in MTB Orienteering history.
Anton Foliforov took a giant step towards
renewing his victory in the World Cup overall
in winning the Middle Distance and Long
Distance stages. The big surprise in the men’s
competition came from Estonia, with Lauri
Malsroos clearly beating Hans Jørgen Kvåle
to win the Sprint stage and get his first-ever
victory in the World Cup. Winning everything there was to win, Emily Benham was
the common denominator for all stages in
the women’s class. By clear margins in the
Middle Distance and Long Distance, but only
three little seconds over Ingrid Stengård on
Sprint, the triumphs of the British athlete
took her to the leadership of the World Cup
and transformed her into the main favourite
for the world titles, five weeks before the
competition.
Russia’s great year
The month of August was heading for its end
when, in Poland, the 12th edition of the World
Mountain Bike Orienteering Championships
took place. With all attention focused on
Białystok and Supraśl, the competitions would
find the new World Champions in the Middle,
Long, Sprint and Relay distances, all of them
also being stages counting in the World Cup
2014’s final round.
After a Mixed Sprint Relay prologue won
by the Russians Tatiana Repina and Ruslan
Gritsan, the real competition started with the
most exciting outcome in the history of the
World Championships, with an epic Sprint
crediting Hans Jørgen Kvåle and Anton Foliforov with the same time and therefore both
awarded gold medals. After her silver medals
in 2009 and 2011, Marika Hara won her first
world title in Sprint, clearly beating the Russian Tatiana Repina. With four male and three
female athletes in the first seven positions on
the respective lists of results, Russia showed
itself firmly determined to avenge the previous season, in which Russia got no gold medals at all for the first time since 2004.
Ruslan Gritsan then took the gold medal in
the Middle Distance, a victory that allowed
the Russian athlete to regain a title that had
escaped him for nine years (!). That makes him
currently the male athlete with the most gold
medals in the history of the World MTB Orienteering Championships with six individual
world titles, overtaking the Australian Adrian
Jackson, World Champion five times. In the
female sector, the Swede Cecilia Thomasson
asserted herself again as one of the greatest
current MTB orienteering experts, winning
the world title in Middle Distance after winning the Sprint gold medal in the 2013 World
Championships.
But it was in the Long Distance, the classic race
of the Championships, that Russia showed
itself at the highest level, with Anton Foliforov
recovering the title he won in 2010 and Olga
Vinogradova being crowned World Champion
for the first time ever in her career. Vinogradova came back to a prominent place in the
results on the last day of competition by winning, along with Tatiana Repina and Svetlana
Poverina, the world title in Women’s Relay,
achieved only once previously by Russia in the
distant year of 2006. With a superbly ridden
last leg Tõnis Erm, the twice World Champion
(Sprint and Middle Distance) in 2013, brought
Estonia its first gold ever in the Relay, climbing
to the highest place on the podium beside his
team-mates Lauri Malsroos and Margus Hallik.
Finland took the silver medals in both the
men’s and the women’s classes.
Tim Robertson (in the middle) from New
Zealand won the Junior World Championships Middle distance. Russia’s Vladislav
Kiselev and Viacheslav Chernykh got
the other medals. Photo: Mårten Lång /
Skogssport
New Zealander Tim
Robertson – Junior
Championship
medals in both
orienteering and
MTB orienteering
The event in Poland also decided the 2014
Masters and Junior World Champions
and incorporated another edition of the
European Youth MTB Orienteering Cup.
The Junior victories of the Swedes Kajsa
Engstrom (Middle Distance) and Oskar
Sandberg (Sprint), added to Cecilia Thomasson’s gold, allowed Sweden to affirm
itself as one of the powerful countries in
the MTBO panorama worldwide.
Another outstanding Junior performance
came from New Zealander Tim Robertson
with the gold medal in Middle Distance
and silver in Sprint – after having won, just
a few weeks before, a Junior world title in
FootO! The Czech Veronika Kubinova won
the Middle Distance gold medal, while
the titles in Long Distance went to the
Austrian Andreas Waldmann and the Finn
Ruska Saarela. Russia in the men’s class
and the Czech Republic in the women’s
class took the Relay titles, with Kubinova
named as the most successful rider of the
Championships.
31
MTB Orienteering
Benham and Foliforov
won World Cup overall
The World Championships results, counted into
the MTB Orienteering World Cup points, left
Anton Foliforov and Emily Benham holding the
top positions. A little short of expectation in
terms of results, Emily Benham ended up with
two World Championships medals - bronze in
Sprint and silver in the Middle Distance. However she stoically defended herself in the World
Cup standings from Marika Hara, the winner
of the World Cup in the three previous years.
Winning in five of the eight individual stages
scoring for the World Cup 2014’s ranking,
Anton Foliforov was unlike last season a strong
winner, renewing an achievement that rewards
32
regular performance at the highest level.
A number of smaller mountain bike orienteering nations have strong individual
athletes – the Lithuanian Jonas Maiselis and
the Portuguese Davide Machado are just two
examples - and they are starting to challenge
the established order in the results. No longer
are the results dominated by a select group
of countries; racing is more exciting, more unpredictable and more challenging. The speed
and skills of the top athletes are reaching new
heights each year. The future is bright and
promising for MTB Orienteering.
Emily Benham’s (GBR) good season
ended with World Cup overall victory.
Photo: Nigel Benham
Tonis Erm celebrating Estonia’s surprise
gold in the World Championships relay.
Photo: Olga Novikova
Turning attention to
the rest of the world
The first ‘fight’ in 2015 is assigned to Miskolc in Hungary at the beginning of May.
After that there is the European Championships in Portugal and the World
Championships in the Czech Republic.
Portugal will host the World Championships – hopefully IOF will continue to have
many applicants each year. This would not
only allow a wider choice of terrain, but also
regions.
For 2016, the International Orienteering
Federation has had the greatest number
of applicants for World Cup rounds since
the World Cup started in 2010. While
only two of these could be chosen – and
Is a World Cup in the USA or South Africa, in
Indonesia or Brazil, a possibility in the future?
MTB Orienteering has developed well in
Europe, and now perhaps it’s time for the big
events to get out into the rest of the world...
33
News in Brief
Nokian Tyres new
sponsor of the IOF
The IOF has signed a three-year sponsorship
contract with Nokian Tyres. Nokian Tyres is
a Finland-based tyre company that focuses
on customer needs in Northern conditions.
It is market leader in the Nordic countries
and Russia, and growing strongly in Central
Europe and North America.
The contract will offer Nokian Tyres visibility
in World Cup events and at the World Orienteering Championships, and in IOF communications. Nokian Tyres will be the title sponsor
for the World Orienteering Championships in
2016 and 2017.
IOF now has 78
members
In 2014, two new countries joined the IOF: Nepal and Uganda. At the same time, Azerbaijan
moved from provisional member to member.
The IOF now has 78 member federations.
Future World
Championships
organisers appointed
Latvia has been appointed organiser of the
2018 World Orienteering Championships and
World Trail Orienteering Championships. In
2017, the World Ski Orienteering Championships will be organised in Russia, and the
World MTB Orienteering Championships in
Lithuania.
Finland will organise the 2017 Junior World
Orienteering Championships in Tampere, in
conjunction with the Fin 5 Orienteering Week.
Ski Orienteering on the
programme of the 53rd
Military World Ski
Championships
Following the successful ski orienteering
event at the 52nd Military World Ski Championships, the IOF has received formal information from CISM that ski orienteering will be on
the programme of the 53rd Military World Ski
Championships as well.
The event will be held in Boden, Sweden in
March 2015. This is the second time ski orienteering is on the programme. This time there
will, however, be two competitions (middle
distance and relay) instead of one as in this
year’s Championships in Sodankylä, Finland.
“This is very good news”, says IOF Senior Vice
President Leho Haldna, who is responsible
for ski orienteering in the IOF Council. “This
proves once more that ski orienteering is a
sport that fits well in international games
organised by other sports organisations than
the IOF. We have been working on event
quality for a longer time, and the work has
begun to bear fruit now.”
34
Orienteering in
The 2017 World Games
The International World Games Association
has announced the sports that will be part
of the official programme of The 2017 World
Games in Wroclaw, Poland. After very successful events in Kaohsiung, Chinese Taipei in
2009 and in Cali, Colombia in 2013, orienteering has been chosen as an official sport for
2017 as well.
The Polish Orienteering Federation has already announced that it will be very happy to
organise the events in Wroclaw in 2017.
Mikko Salonen new
member of IOF Council
The IOF Council for 2014–2016 was elected at the XXVII IOF General Assembly
in Lavarone, Italy. The previous Council was re-elected with the exception that
Timo Ritakallio (FIN) was replaced by Mikko Salonen (FIN), former Chair of the
IOF Foot Orienteering Commission and former General Manager of the Finnish Orienteering Federation.
Facebook “f ” Logo
Jørn Sundby was
the Assistant
SEA at the World
Championships
2014.
Photo: Erik Borg
instagram.com/iof_orienteering
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CMYK / .ai
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Jørn Sundby appointed Senior
Event Adviser for World
Orienteering Championships
Jørn Sundby (NOR) has been appointed IOF Senior Event Adviser for the
World Orienteering Championships 2015–2018. In this task Sundby replaces IOF Sports Director Björn Persson, who will leave his job in December.
“I am glad we have found such a competent person to replace Björn Persson at this short notice. A quick decision was needed in order to continue
the work for the upcoming World Championships. This appointment gives
the IOF the time to consider the role of a possible Sports Director in the
future”, IOF Secretary General Barbro Rönnberg comments.
youtube.com/user/IOFOrienteering
twitter.com/IOFOrienteering
35
IOF Members
IOF Members (as of 21 November 2014)
*ARG: Federacion del Deporte de Orientacion de la Republica Argentina, [email protected]
AUS: Orienteering Australia, [email protected], www.orienteering.asn.au
AUT: Österreichischer Fachverband für OL, [email protected], www.oefol.at
AZE: Orienteering Federation of the Republic of Azerbaijan, [email protected], www.smef.az
BAR: Barbados Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
BEL: Belgian Orienteering Federation ABSO-BVOS, [email protected], www.orienteering.be
BLR: Belarus Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.belarus-orient.org
BRA: Confederacao Brasileira de Orientacao, [email protected], www.cbo.org.br
BUL: Bulgarian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.bgof.org
CAN: Orienteering Canada, [email protected], www.orienteering.ca
*CHI: Federación Chilena de Orientación, [email protected]
CHN: Orienteering Association of China, [email protected], www.oacn.org
*CMR: Association Sportive D’Orientation du Cameroun, [email protected]
COL: Federación Colombiana de Orientación, [email protected]
CRO: Croatian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.orienteering.hr
*CUB: Cuban Orienteering Federation
CZE: Cesky svaz orientacnich sportu, [email protected], www.orientacnisporty.cz
CYP: Cyprus Mountaineering, Sport Climbing and Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.komoaa.com
DEN: Dansk Orienterings-Forbund, [email protected], www.do-f.dk
*ECU: Federación Ecuatoriana de Orientación, [email protected], www.fedeo.org
ESP: Federatión Española de Orientación, [email protected], www.fedo.org
EST: Eesti Orienteerumisliit, [email protected], www.orienteerumine.ee
FIN: Suomen Suunnistusliitto, [email protected], www.suunnistusliitto.fi
FRA: Fédération Française de Course d’Orientation, [email protected], www.ffcorientation.fr
GBR: British Orienteering, [email protected], www.britishorienteering.org.uk
*GEO: Georgian Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
GER: Deutscher Turner Bund, Abteilung Sport Orientierungslauf, [email protected], www.orientierungslauf.de
*GRE: Hellenic Orienteering Club (of Thessaloniki), [email protected]
*GRE: Hellenic Orienteering Club
HKG: Orienteering Association of Hong Kong, [email protected], www.oahk.org.hk
36
HUN: Magyar Tájékozódási Futó Szövetség, [email protected], www.mtfsz.hu
*INA: Federation Orienteering National of Indonesia, [email protected]
*IND: Orienteering Federation of India, [email protected]
*IRI: Iranian Federation of Sport Associations, [email protected], www.ifsafed.ir
IRL: Irish Orienteering Association, [email protected], www.orienteering.ie
ISR: Israel Sport Orienteering Association, [email protected], www.nivut.org.il
ITA: Federazione Italiana Sport Orientamento, [email protected], www.fiso.it
*JAM: Jamaica Orienteering Federation
JPN: Nihon Orienteering Kyokai, [email protected], www.orienteering.or.jp
KAZ: Sport Orienteering Federation of the Republic of Kazakhstan, [email protected], www.orienteering.lik.kz
*KEN: Bushtrekkers Orienteering Club Kenya, [email protected]
*KGZ: Kyrgyzstan Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
KOR: Korea Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.kof.or.kr
LAT: Latvian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.lof.lv
LIE: Orienteering Liechtenstein, [email protected]
LTU: Lithuanian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.losf.lt
*MAS: Magnet Edge Orienteering Perak Malaysia, [email protected]
MDA: Moldavian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.orienteering.md
MGL: Mongolian Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
*MKD: Macedonian Orienteering Sport, [email protected]
MNE: Mountaineering association of Montenegro, [email protected], www.pscg.me
*MOZ: Associacao de Orientacao da Cidade de Maputo
NED: Nederlandse Orienteringsloop Bond, [email protected], www.nolb.nl
*NEP: Orienteering Federation of Nepal, [email protected]
NOR: Norges Orienteringsforbund, [email protected], www.orientering.no
NZL: New Zealand Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.nzorienteering.com
*PAK: Pakistan Orienteering Association, [email protected]
*PAK: Pakistan Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
*PAN: Panama Orienteering Club
POL: Polski Zwiazek Orientacji Sportowej, [email protected], www.orienteering.org.pl
POR : Federacão Portuguesa de Orientacão, [email protected], www.fpo.pt
PRK: Amateur Orienteering Association of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea
*PUR: Puerto Rico Sports for All
ROU: Romanian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.fro.ro
RSA: The South African Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.orienteering.co.za
RUS: Russian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.rufso.ru
SLO: Orientacijska Zveza Slovenije, [email protected], www.orientacijska-zveza.si
*SOM: Somali Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
SRB: Serbian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.orijentiring.rs
SUI: Swiss Orienteering, [email protected], www.swiss-orienteering.ch
SVK : Slovenský zväz orientacných športov, [email protected], www.orienteering.sk
SWE: Svenska Orienteringsförbundet, [email protected], www.orientering.se
*THA: Thailand’s Orienteering Association
TPE: Chinese Taipei Orienteering Association, [email protected], www.orienteering.org.tw
TUR: Turkish Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.orienteering.org.tr
*UGA: Uganada Orienteering Federation, [email protected]
UKR: Ukrainian Orienteering Federation, [email protected], www.orienteering.org.ua
*URU: Uruguayan Orienteering Association, [email protected]
USA: Orienteering USA, [email protected], www.orienteeringusa.org
*VEN: Club de Senderismo y Orientacion Deportiva
37
Major Events
2015
Orienteering World Cup, 1 Round
2–11 January
Tasmania, AUS
st
World Ski Orienteering Championships
9–15 February
Hamar, NOR
Junior World Ski Orienteering Championships
9–15 February
Hamar, NOR
World Masters Ski Orienteering Championchips
19–25 January
Lenzerheide, SUI
MTB Orienteering World Cup, 1st Round
1–3 May
Miskolc, HUN
Orienteering World Cup, 2nd Round
3–7 June
Bohuslän, SWE and Halden, NOR
MTB Orienteering World Cup, 2nd Round
8–14 June
Idanha–a–Nova, POR
World Masters MTB Orienteering Championships
8–14 June
World Trail Orienteering Championships
22–28 June
Zagreb, CRO
Junior World Orienteering Championships
4–10 July
Rauland, NOR
World Masters Orienteering Championships
25 July – 1 August
Gothenburg, SWE
World Orienteering Championships
1–7 August
Inverness, Scotland, GBR
Orienteering World Cup, 3rd Round
1–7 August
Inverness, Scotland, GBR
World MTB Orienteering Championships
14–23 August
Liberec, CZE
MTB Orienteering World Cup, 3rd Round
14–23 August
Liberec, CZE
Junior World MTB Orienteering Championships
14–23 August
Liberec, CZE
Orienteering World Cup, 4th Round
3–5 October
Arosa, SUI
38
2016
Regional events 2015
World Masters Ski Orienteering Championships/
World Cup 2nd Round
Dates to be confirmed.
GER
Oceania Orienteering Championships
2–11 January
Tasmania, AUS
MTB Orienteering World Cup 1st Round
FRA
Orienteering World Cup 1st Round
21–28 May
Jesenik, CZE
9–15 July
Engadin, SUI
World Masters Orienteering Championships
6–13 August
Tallinn, EST
World MTB Orienteering Championships
24–30 July
Aveiro–Coimbra, POR
MTB Orienteering World Cup, 2nd Round
24–30 July
Junior World MTB Orienteering Championships
24–30 July
Nokian Tyres World Orienteering Championships
20–28 August
Strömstad–Tanum, SWE
Orienteering World Cup, 3rd Round
20–28 August
World Trail Orienteering Championships
20–28 August
MTB Orienteering World Cup 3rd Round
LTU
Orienteering World Cup 4th Round
14–16 October
Aarau, SUI
2017
Nokian Tyres World Orienteering Championships
1–7 July
Otepää, EST
Tampere, FIN
European Ski Orienteering Championships
19–25 January
Lenzerheide, SUI
European Youth Ski Orienteering Championships
9–15 February
Hamar, NOR
European Youth Orienteering Championships
25–28 June
Cluj Napoca, ROU
European MTB Orienteering Championships
8–14 June
Regional events 2016
European Orienteering Championships
21–28 May
Jesenik, CZE
European Trail Orienteering Championships
21–28 May
Jesenik, CZE
MEETINGS
IOF Presidents’ Conference
August 2015, in conjunction with the World Orienteering Championships in Inverness, Scotland,
GBR
IOF General Assembly
July 2016, in conjunction with the Nokian Tyres
World Orienteering Championships in
IOF Council
16–18 January 2015, (Council and Commissions)
10–11 April 2015
August 2015, in conjunction with the World
Orienteering Championships in Inverness,
Scotland, GBR
39
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CMYK / .ai
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youtube.com/user/IOFOrienteering
instagram.com/iof_orienteering
twitter.com/IOFOrienteering

Fast Forward for South America - International Orienteering Federation

Transcription

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