Senior Selection Policy 2009 World Championships

[Axel]

I have been reading through the recent information updates for the Junior and Senior Selection policies for JWOC and the Senior World Championships for 2009.
Below is the selection policy for the GB Team for the 2009 World Championships. Unfortunately the selection races for the world champs fall over the same dates as the pre JWOC training and JWOC 2009. Does this mean none of the JWOC competitors will be considered for selection for the World Championship Teams. I know time is short between JWOC and the pre WOC Camp but because of the dearth of candidates for the Womens Senior Team perhaps BO should take into consideration the pre JWOC form and the results at these champs for the inclusion of the best Junior female into the team.

World Championships, Hungary (14-23 August) and Pre WOC Camp (21-26
July);
Up to 7 men and 7 women will be selected.
The main indicators of current form will be the Special WOC Selection races in the
South West/Wales (a sprint, middle and long over the weekend 3rd – 5th July).
Form during the selection races may be used to select any athlete for any discipline.
It is hoped that this will encourage all athletes to run all disciplines.
Results at the end of selection races will be used. Split times during the races may be
used in allocating disciplines.
Some athletes may be pre-selected. If so, such pre-selection may be subject to
demonstrating fitness levels.

[harry]

I'm thinking this post might have been better as an email to the new international boss rather than a post on a forum?? way to put pressure on someone..

I think there's some overlap between junior & senior races during the domestic season, don't the juniors & seniors have the same race over sprint & middle several times? If the likes of Julia & Mairead are regularly kicking senior butt then I'm sure they'll get some chances to run senior internationals. Mhairi and Alison did a few years back but they were coming in the top 10 at JWOC & Mhairi was mixing it in the top 5 of D20E at Swedish Oringen. Getting those types of results at junior level would be a good way to get the senior selectors attention.

Define dearth: 6 British women went to WOC, two others beat the WOC long distance Champion at WUOC, another beat almost everyone in the WOC sprint trial & is one of the top U23 fell runners in the UK, another who's not been in any teams in 2008 got a top result in a european marathon, there's another who was top 30 at JWOC last year and is now training well amongst some of Norway's best. & I've heard that a couple of previous podium-getters who haven't been at their best or who've had time out from the sport might be making comebacks.
Just because we ain't racing in the South of England doesn't mean we don't exist!

[Big Jon]

From my observations over a few years I doubt that any orienteer can successfully peak for 2 MAJOR races in a short period of time - particularly when they are JWOC with its multiple races in a week for all athletes and WOC with high competition qualification and finals. If a junior fancied their chances at WOC, they could either miss out JWOC and go solely for WOC (the high risk strategy, but with the best chance of a high WOC result) or they could go to JWOC and race perhaps 2 disciplines in order to conserve themselves for a possible WOC race.