Norway’s relay team won by just two seconds, as the first ever Sprint Relay at the Junior World Orienteering Championships took place in Aguiar da Beira, Portugal.
The Sprint Relay was added to the JWOC program just this weekend as the forest distances had to be postponed due to the risk of fires in the Portuguese forests. And just as in the individual sprint on Monday, the races were held in the tricky terrain in and around the village of Carapito.
After two legs, it was hard to tell that Norway would end up with gold medals around their necks. The Norwegian team was in ninth position after Oda Scheele’s and Mikkel Holt’s legs and had more than a minute to catch on the Czech leaders.
But Tobias Alstad, who won silver in the sprint on Monday, had a phenomenal race and picked up eight places, sending out Pia Young Vik just 12 seconds behind Finland. She quickly overtook the lead and kept Hungary’s Rita Maramarosi and Marketa Mulickova from Czech Republic behind her in the end to win the Sprint Relay.
Watch the tv-production from the race, GPS-tracking and results at IOF LIVE.
The junior athletes will run an unofficial urban sprint relay on Friday, due the postponement of the forest distances.
Results:
- Norway 57:50 (Oda Scheele, Mikkel Holt, Tobias Alstad, Pia Young Vik)
- Hungary 57:52 (Boglarka Czako, Peter Nagy, Zoltan Bujdoso, Rita Maramarosi)
- Czech Republic 57:55 (Anna Karlova, Jakub Chaloupsky, Daniel Bolehovsky, Marketa Mulickova)
- Finland 58:08 (Hanne Hilo, Aaro Ojala, Touko Seppa, Elisa Mattila)
- Sweden 58:12 (Alva Björk, Noel Braun, Axel Elmblad, Elsa Sonesson)
- Switzerland 58:18 (Lilly Graber, Joschi Schmid, Pascal Schaerer, Sanna Hotz)
Photos: JWOC / Susana Luzir