World Cup Norway

[buzz]

Amidst all the hype for that other event in Brazil, IOF are sneaking in a few rounds of the orienteering World Cup at Kongsberg in Norway, kicking off this weekend with Middle and Long races and then next Wednesday and Thursday there's a Sprint and an unofficial Sprint Relay. This year's world cup gains more significance with start blocks for WOC based on world rankings.

All the usual links for live TV, GPS tracking etc are at World of O

http://news.worldofo.com/2014/06/06/world-cup-kongsberg-imatra-all-you-need-to-know/

Plenty of Brits in action. The selections were:

Middle (Saturday)
Men: Scott Fraser, Graham Gristwood, Hector Haines, Mark Nixon, Matthew Speake and Douglas Tullie
Women: Lucy Butt, Hollie Orr, Helen Palmer, Catherine Taylor, Clare Ward and Charlotte Watson

Long (Sunday)
Men: Scott Fraser, Graham Gristwood, Hector Haines, Mark Nixon, Matthew Speake and Douglas Tullie
Women: Hollie Orr, Helen Palmer, Catherine Taylor and Clare Ward

Sprint (Wednesday)
Men: Scott Fraser, Peter Hodkinson, Chris Smithard and Murray Strain
Women: Tessa Hill and Catherine Taylor

Sprint Relay (Thursday)
Team: Scott Fraser, Tessa Hill, Murray Strain and Catherine Taylor

[JamieP]

After the WOC/WUOC trials at the end of March there were a few additional selections made: Alan Cherry, James Tullie and Jessica Tullie for the middle/long and Ruth Holmes for the sprint.

It also looks like (from the published list of runners) a few people have dropped out leaving, for the middle/long:
Men: Cherry, Fraser, Haines, Speake, D Tullie, J Tullie
Women: Orr, Palmer, Taylor, Ward, Butt, Watson, Tullie

Don't know about the sprint.

With GPS tracking and online tv coverage it sounds like this could put a serious dent in my revision for finals.

[ba-ba]

Shminty had an ankle operation a few weeks ago. Won't be running.

[afterthought]

I guess Scott's current World Ranking position means he may starting quite early. In fact, apart from Cat, all the GB runners may be earlier rather than later. With good coverage on the web it's quite an incentive for those not at the LAMM, or revising for finals, to get going early and tune in.

First starts:
Saturday (Middle) - 11am British time, Sunday (Long) - 8:30am.

[Jon X]

It does indeed mean Scott is off early.
Start list at
http://eventor.orientering.no/Events/St ... EventClass

Terrain looks great - looking forward to seeing what our team can do!

[Jethro]

Unfortunately Jess has cracked a bone in her elbow following a fall at the Scottish (she carried on and finished her course and even attended the SOA AGM afterwards!)

[buzz]

Good start for housewife in the middle.

Anyone got tracking up?

[buzz]

Good starts for Hollie and Doug too.

Looks like housewife's lost 30 secs but hanging in.

[Lard]

And Hollie & Doug (Lots of things crossed whilst I say this).

Women's tracking available but looks like only last 20 ranked.
No men's yet. Not a bad result from Cherry

[Lard]

Come on Doug, Come on Hollie!!!!
Both looking solid so far....

[buzz]

Hollie safely home - second at the finish but two mins down.

[afterthought]

I guess that's a mixed bag of results for the GBR athletes. Well done those who are pleased. Commiserations to those who aren't. Good luck to those running again tomorrow.

I enjoyed the coverage - it worked very well I thought and it showed a lot of very high standard of orienteering. I liked catching glimpses of GBR runners at TV1 and in the runin, and on the whole the online results, live GPS, and captions made up for my not understanding most of the commentary and interviews.

TV made a lot of use "sync" GPS to show how a current runner compared to previous runners, and this was I thought very effective in the men's race. It was set-up for that nicely: a Norwegian (home) runner home in the lead, just overtaken by a Finn, then two more Norwegians coming in very close in time, the first just missing and the second just taking it. And finally a Swiss flying down the run-in to take joint third.

In the not-at-all close women's race the "sync" I thought was less effective. As World-of-O says "When Alexandersson runs a top technical race, nobody has a chance to beat her." So what to show on TV from the GPS? At 10Mila the focus for GPS on TV seemed to be on showing mistakes but happily that wasn't the case today. And in a long or sprint route choice can be a good theme for GPS.

[DIDSCO]

Despite losing 1 minute on the last control Doug's run was a strong performance. He ran a real good split on the longest leg, right up there with the top few today, suggesting he's hitting good forest running shape.

[Jethro]

Doug's result impressive considering James and he only flew out from Edinburgh at 9pm on Friday after attending their Granny's funeral, and then had to drive to the event on Sat morning.

[afterthought]

I don't know how today's (Long) startlists are worked out, but it seems nearly all ten GBR athletes have strong runners starting 3 minutes behind them. (I am thinking maybe not Matt, but perhaps I am doing Osaki, Hirokazu JPN, a disservice - my apologies if so.)