After the exciting Sprint block, the third day of the JWOC 2023 moved to Valea Alba to contest the Middle Distance race, this year with a direct final. The course-setters did a great job, designing challenging courses, where the runners had to be very precise and efficiently use their orienteering techniques to progress at high (or rather very high!) speed through the magnificent Romanian forest. Look at the maps, isn’t it beautiful?!
WOMEN CLASS
In the women’s class, the victory went to the Swiss runner Henriette Radzikowski, who managed to run a consistent and clean race, beating the Czech Lucie Dittrichova by just 4 seconds. The Norwegian Pia Young Vik closed the podium with her third medal in this JWOC (2 silver and 1 bronze for the moment). Two-time champion Rita Maramarosi led the race in the first half, but two mistakes at controls 7 and 13 left her out of the fight for the positions of honor, finishing in the 12th position. Special mention for the Halden SK runner Inés Berger who finished in a worthy 4th place, just 5 seconds off bronze. Good job!
The leg 4-5 was one of the most challenging in the course, and where we could see big mistakes. It is a diagonal downhill in a dense area to end on a “small” cliff in the slope (height was not specified in the control description…). Going straight is very risky, and only Pia Young Vik took the fastest left option among the favorites.
Another interesting leg was 5-6, where the runners had the option of running straight down the steep “Swiss slope” (as the speakers called it) or turning right to use the path to avoid the steepest area. There were no great differences in time, among those who executed correctly.
The last part of the course, which seemed quite easy and fast, was, however, really decisive. In this fragment, we can see the mistake of the Norwegian Pia Young Vik in the 12th control, who commits a steering inaccuracy losing about 30 seconds. Let’s remember that she was only 14 seconds away from gold at the end!
And here, also in the final part of the route, we see how Rita Maramarosi made her second mistake, this one of more than 1 minute in the 13th control, which definitely kept her from getting on the podium for the third time in this JWOC.
4 000 m, 152 starting competitors
| Plac | Name | Organisation | Time | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Henriette Radzikowski | SUI Switzerland | 25:42 | |
| 2 | Lucie Dittrichova | CZE Czechia | 25:46 | +0:04 |
| 3 | Pia Young Vik | NOR Norway | 25:56 | +0:14 |
| 4 | Ines Berger | SUI Switzerland | 26:01 | +0:19 |
| 5 | Ingeborg Rygg Eikeland | NOR Norway | 26:09 | +0:27 |
| 6 | Alma Svennerud | SWE Sweden | 26:13 | +0:31 |
| 7 | Viktoria Mag | HUN Hungary | 26:16 | +0:34 |
| 8 | Eeva Liina Ojanaho | FIN Finland | 26:22 | +0:40 |
| 9 | Mathea Gloeersen | NOR Norway | 26:26 | +0:44 |
| 10 | Elsa Sonesson | SWE Sweden | 26:49 | +1:07 |
MEN CLASS
In the men’s class, the differences were much greater than in the girls. Swedish runner Hannes Mogensen won the gold with a margin of just under 1 minute, running at an absolutely impressive pace: 5:01 min/km!!! The podium was completed with the Czech Jakub Chaloupsky in second place (who was leading the race for part of the morning), and the Danish runner Oscar David Brom Jensen in bronze position.
In the first part of the course, direct orienteering and precision with the compass predominated, as well as clean entry to control were key aspects. Here we see leg 3-4, which was run as straight as possible, and where some of the runners (both Swedish, for example) were pushing hard from the start.
The leg 9-10 was the same as the leg 5-6 for the girls, and also in the men’s class, it brought a lot of headaches to the runners. However, according to the GPS data, the boys took better advantage of the option on the right (using the path) to get the best split.
4 900 m, 176 starting competitors
| Plac | Name | Organisation | Time | Diff |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hannes Mogensen | SWE Sweden | 24:39 | |
| 2 | Jakub Chaloupsky | CZE Czechia | 25:22 | +0:43 |
| 3 | Oscar David Brom Jensen | DEN Denmark | 25:55 | +1:16 |
| 4 | Noel Braun | SWE Sweden | 26:30 | +1:51 |
| 5 | Pascal Schaerer | SUI Switzerland | 26:37 | +1:58 |
| 5 | Dominic Mueller | SUI Switzerland | 26:37 | +1:58 |
| 7 | Aarni Ronkainen | FIN Finland | 27:19 | +2:40 |
| 8 | Alfred Bjoerneroed | NOR Norway | 27:28 | +2:49 |
| 9 | Daniel Bolehovsky | CZE Czechia | 27:31 | +2:52 |
| 10 | Matthieu Buehrer | SUI Switzerland | 27:37 | +2:58 |
Congratulations to the winners! The JWOC now will have a rest day, before heading into the last two races: long distance on Friday, and Relay on Saturday.
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